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Our Houses, Their Stories
Visit the Our Houses web site
A biography of the houses in the village
of Cairndow
Send us comments, or
information about your house
Cuil Cottage, 2007 |
Cuil Cottage, 1947 |
How it all began....
One of the first things we did was to
photograph all Cairndow houses. And in our early days Alice
Beattie meticulously recorded data about who lived in which house from
the first 1841 census. More recently, as we collected, scanned
and catalogued our photo collection we began to amass a photo gallery
of people who had lived, and live, in Cairndow. Out of this
emerged the idea "Our Houses: Their Stories". Alice has not only
provided, from her own archive and memory, some of the most enchanting
material, but once again has been the driving force gathering photos
and reminiscences.
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Alice at work & her
sketch of her childhood home - Glaschoine |
Glaschoine 1940's and 2007 |
Interim Exhibition
In order to raise awareness of the
work HWA was undertaking, and to encourage people to
contribute further, we showcased the findings of several months work at
the Cairndow village hall. The two day event focused on seven houses -
photographs, local knowledge, plans (where possible) and architectural
studies for each. The exhibition was well received and confirmed our
belief that this information was indeed interesting to all. Encouraged
by the success of the exhibition we made steps to take the project
further.
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Exhibition Sat. 24th and Sun. 25th of
March 2007 |
An Example....
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East Lodge
This tiny lodge once housed 14
people! Hugh Ferguson, born in 1829, lived there with his wife Sarah
and their 12 children.
By the time of the 1841 census, three elder children had left and
obviously feeling the house a bit roomy, they took in a lodger - a
gardener. Hugh emigrated to New Zealand via Australia where he worked
in the gold fields of Collingwood.
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East Lodge 1939 - 1942
The excerpts below are
taken from information given by Helen Dunion (nee Hepburn), now living
in Canada. Helen was evacuated from Glasgow at the beginning of the
war, to stay with her Grandpa and Granny, Mr & Mrs Ure (pictured
below right) at East Lodge. Mr Ure was the gate keeper and kept
the drives tidy.
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"On the next wall was
a huge sideboard with cupboards & drawers & a mirror. On top of
that there were pictures & a glass chicken with a lid. This is
where the peppermints were kept.
"The toilet was
across the avenue, down a
little curved path to an outhouse with a chemical toilet. Toilet paper
was tissue paper squares and the tissue from Mandarin oranges at
Christmas!
"Outside the house
there was a large box on legs with a fine wire
screen door. That was our fridge."
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East Lodge |
Mr & Mrs Ure |
We have begun to understand
the impact of a house on families, and individuals, on how you live -
"a house is more than just bricks and mortar". Perhaps this raises
questions about what is and isn't important for dwellings in the future.
The Next Stage
- To put together a funding
application for some two years work. This will include upgrading a
database that will suit, or can be adapted to suit our needs.
- It needs to be very visual,
with old and new pictures of each house, inside and out, and any
unusual or architectural features. There will also be audio
recollections and a list of the owners/occupiers through the years from
1841 to the present.
- The cataloguing of all the data
onto the database will be time consuming. However it is essential that
it fits our purpose and that it can be constantly updated for the
future.
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Dunderave Cottage 1950's |
Dunderave Cottage today |
Features |
While compiling our funding application we,
the community and our professional consultants will discuss our
ultimate goal - comprehensive exhibition at a National Museum?
DVD? Book? Village party etc. etc. etc.
With special thanks to:
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