Lumberkids, Uig, 1945
Joyce Holt writes...
"The shortage of labour at this time <1945, during the war> was great enough that a blind eye seems to have been turned to the age of the children. Some were just 11.
These children lived in Sandbank or Dunoon, and came daily, by lorry from Sandbank bus terminus to the nursery at Uig. They brought sandwiches and bottles of something to drink, usually fizzy lemonade in lurid colours. We worked from 8 a.m. till 3:30 p.m. (I think).There were 'breaks' at 10:30, 12 noon and ca 2:45 each day. The midges were awful, and we burned old sacks to keep them away. When it rained hard, we sheletered in the various sheds around the nursery. The employment was generally in weeding the little seedlings, which were laid out in nursery beds ca 3 ft wide. There was a 'gaffer' keeping us in order. The foreman was Andy Hopkins who lived in the bungalow at the entrance from the Benmore Road, and Mr Jackson was the forester in charge.
I did this job every summer from the age of 12 till I was ca 19, latterly with the 'research department, run by Mr Thompson who lived at the beginning of the road from Cothouse to Kilmun. In this more senior job, we weeded sometimes, applied treatments to experimental patches of trees, brashed the stands of mature trees in the Kilmun Arboretum, and measured quarter-girths of felled trees at Glenbranter."
The people in this shot are...
S signifies from Sandbank, D from Dunoon.
Front row, seated. Left to right as you view. Jean Currie (S), Carol Whyte (S), ? (S), ?(S), ? (S), Moira Whyte (S), Alistair Jack, ? (S), Bobby ?(S), ?(S), Mary Morrison (S). (One of these wee Sandbank boys was a McCowan or Cowan, another Douglas? Currie).
Standing. Front row. Milda Campbell (S), ? (S), Maud Jack (S), Jean MacKenzie (S), May McKenzie (D), Edith McCorquodale (S), Marion Ramsay (D). Back row. Nan McKenzie (D), Lillian McLean (D), Jean Renfrew (D), Helen McGilp (D), Betty Sands(S), Joyce Lockhart (D).
The youngest children would have been ca 11 years old, and the oldest ca 14. Missing from the photo are sisters and cousins of those present, including two of my own cousins from Dunoon. May Henderson, (S) onetime World Champion Highland Dancer was absent that day.
DOWNLOAD Joyce's lively essay "Recollections of a lumberkid" as a pdf file below.
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Groups: Groups of people
Joyce Lockhart Comment left on 09 January 2008 at 19:05 by Joyce Lockhart