I finish up from work today for Christmas holidays. So, today’s scheduled post has a festive feel. A little poem of my own for all you kind people following this ever growing Blantyre Project entering it’s 14th incredible year! Beneath the winter’s starlit glow,Where Clyde’s cold waters softly flow,Blantyre sleeps, its past still near,Our tales […]
This excellent poem was sent in anonymously to the newspaper by the rather amusing person, self calling themselves “AuchenWarlock”, in January 1901. Titled, the Blantyre Ghost. A local poem, you may not have heard before, now 122 years old! I won’t pretend to understand all the “auld language”, but I definitely get the ‘jist’. I’ll […]
Mr John Hastie of High Blantyre was born in 1846 and is noted in the 1879 Naismith’s Directory as an ironmonger at Gardiner’s Place, High Blantyre. It is thought he was there prior to 1871. He ran a business in Blantyre and later in Burnbank also. You could even buy sticks of Gelatine Dynamite from his […]
Alongside this photo of the former shrine within David Livingstone Centre, is this nice Blantyre poem, shared by Jean McLean , from a project she undertook in the early 1960s. Blantyre O land twixt Calder’s groves and Clyde,Since days of old, fair Blantyre’s pride,Who to thy sons hast freely given,Those gifts for which they’ve humbly […]
It’s been a difficult couple of years. People taken from us before they should be. This is often a difficult time of year for some people and makes us all a little bit more nostalgic. Today, on Christmas Day, I’m pausing to remember absent relatives and hope you’ll join me in raising a glass to […]
A wonderful poem about the 1930 Auchinraith Pit disaster in Blantyre. Written by Tom Penman of Airdrie, its shared here telling the story of yet another significant pit explosion in Blantyre, which happened on Saturday 30th August 1930. I have to admit though, Tom’s frustration and even anger comes across towards the pit owners, to […]
Blantyre Project reader, Tommy Stewart sent a message recently about David Crawford, former Headmaster of High Blantyre School. Tommy told me, “Hi Paul, I was born and raised in Blantyre but now live in Colchester. I attended High Blantyre Primary School from 1962 – 1969. If it is of any interest to you, I attach […]