Looking up something else, my eye was caught by an entry for the "Canadian Home for Friendless Girls", which existed from the 1870s - 1890s in the long built-over Lauriston Lane ImageImage
Also known as the "Edinburgh Emigration Home" it was an institution that took in "young women who have fallen from virtue and desire to redeem their character" or "young girls who have lost one or both parents or have living parents... of loose character."
Ultimately the purpose was to "reform" and/or "train" these girls or women to be placed in domestic service in Canada. It seems over its 20 or so years of existence some 300 were "assisted" to emigrate.
It was founded by one Mrs Margaret Blaikie, wife of The Very Rev. William Garden Blaikie, a Free Church minister, writer and temperance proponent
As minister, it was Blaikie who commissioned the bulding of Pilrig Free Church and a rather grand new manse for himself ImageImage
Blaikie formed a society which commission the Pilrig Model Buildings to provide model workers housing, one of the first such instances in Edinburgh. These were a sort of progenitor of the later Colonies housing. They are now known as Shaw's Buildings or Shaw's St./Terr/Plce. Image
Blaikie later moved on to teaching at the New College, and he and his wife moved to a villa in the Grange on Palmerston Road Image

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More from @cocteautriplets

May 11
The derailment by strikers of the Flying Scotsman on May 10th 1926 has meant a much more serious and fatal rail accident in Edinburgh later that same day which claimed 3 lives and injured many has been somewhat overlooked 🧵👇🚂
The 1:06PM train from Berwick-upon-Tweed to Edinburgh hit a goods train being shunted across its path at St. Margaret's Depot just west of the tunnel under London Road. Due to the General Strike, most signal boxes were unmanned and only a rudimentary signalling system was running
The busy but confined St. Margaret's depot was on both sides of the LNER East Coast Mainline as it approached Edinburgh, with Piershill Junction for Leith and north Edinburgh to its east and the 60 yard tunnel under London Road constraining it to the west. OS 1944/5 Town Survey of Edinburgh showing the mainline running through St. Margaret's Depot. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland
Read 26 tweets
Apr 30
It's been hard to find time recently for any in-depth threading, but I think tonight we can sneak in the story of the lesser-known Leith shipyard of Ramage & Ferguson, builders of luxury steam mega-yachts to the Victorian and Edwardian elites. ⛵️🧵👇 The modelmakers loft at Ramage & Ferguson, 1906. © Edinburgh City Libraries
In its working life from 1877 to 1934, the Ramage & Ferguson yard built 269 ships: 80, almost 1/3 of the total, were luxury steam yachts, built mainly to the designs of the 3 most prominent yacht designers in the world. It became the go-to shipyard for the rich and famous Image
When I say yachts, don't think about those little plastic things bobbing around in marinas these days. We're talking about multi-hundred (up to two thousand!) ton wooden and steel palaces, fitted out to the standards of ocean liners Launch of a yacht for an American customer at Ramage & Ferguson, late 1890s or early 20th century.
Read 56 tweets
Apr 7
As promised / threatened, there now follows a thread about the origins and abolition of the Tawse as the instrument of discipline in Scottish teaching. So lets start off with the Tawse - what is it and how did it evolve? 🧵👇
"Tawis" or "tawes" is a Scots word going back to c. 16th c., a plural of a leather belt or strap. In turn this came from the Middle English "tawe", leather tanned so as to keep it supple. Such devices were long the favoured instrument of corporal punishment in Scottish education "The Dominie Functions",  George Harvey (1806–1876). © The Stirling Smith Art Gallery & Museum via ArtUK
In 1848, George Mckarsie sued Archibald Dickson, schoolmaster of Auchtermuchty, for assaulting his son without provocation with a tawse "severely on the head, face and arms to the effusion of his blood". He was awarded a shilling but had to pay all expenses!
Read 67 tweets
Jan 24
This pub has been in the news for the wrong reasons recently, but despite appearances it's a very important pub; a surviving example of only a handful of such interwar hostelries built in #Edinburgh - the Roadhouse. And these 9 pubs have a story to tell. Shall we unravel it?🧵👇 The Anchor Inn, West Granton Road.
The short version of the Roadhouse story is thus: a blend of 1930s architecture and glamour used by the licensed trade to attract a new generation of sophisticated, Holywood-inspired, car-driving drinkers. That's partly true, but not the full story here 1934 Dunlop Tyres advert showing cars arriving at an Art Deco Roadhouse. © Illustrated London News
To understand how Edinburgh got its roadhouses we have to go back to 1913 when the Temperance movement was at the peak of its power and the Temperance (Scotland) Act was passed. This was also known as the Local Veto Act as it allowed localities to force referendums on going "dry" British Women's Temperance Association banner of the, Scottish Christian Union. 1900. © Edinburgh City Libraries
Read 64 tweets
Jan 18
In 1839, Dr. Thomas Smith of 21 Duke (now Dublin) Street in #Edinburgh tried on himself a purified extract of "Indian Hemp" - Cannabis sativa. He "gave an interesting account of its physiological action!". He was most probably the first person in Scotland to get high. Dr Thomas Smith of T. & H. Smith. 1807-1893
The medicinal and psychoactive properties of "Indian Hemp" had only just been introduced to Western medicine that year by Irish doctor William Brooke O'Shaughnessy, so it's unlikely anyone had done so before.
Cannabis seeds were advertised for sale in Edinburgh in the Caledonian Mercury as far back as 1761 (apply to the Gardener at Hermitage House in Leith), but these probably refer to Hemp: Cannabis sativa. 🌱
Read 30 tweets
Dec 29, 2023
Between 1950 and 1973, #Edinburgh built 77 municipal, multi-storey housing blocks (of 7 storeys or more), containing 6,084 flats across 968 storeys. So as promised, I've gone and made a spreadsheet inventory of them all. Let's have a look at them chronologically 🧵👇 Screenshot - spreadsheet of Edinburgh's multi-storey municipal housing blocks.
1950-51 saw the first such building - the 8 storey Westfield Court with 88 flats (and a nursery on the roof!) Built by local builders Hepburn Bros, it was heavily inspired by London's Kensal House by Maxwell Fry. It was a bit of a 1-off though and is rather unique in the city. Westfield Court
There then followed a series of experimental mid-rise blocks, variations on a theme, as a rather conservative local administration (headed by the Progressive Party) tried to work out what it wanted to do regards high-rise housing post-war.
Read 45 tweets

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