Willie Milne Head Forester Culbin Forest
Rosemary Armour of Forres has provided a newspaper image of her grandfather when he featured in a newspaper article This is my Country which covered the Culbin Forest story in 1965.
Willie Milne had a long career in forestry starting near his Aberdeenshire at age 14 in Fasque Estate as a general worker. There he was encouraged to go to the Forestry Commission Apprentices School at Beaufort near Beauly and attended there from 1927-1929. He worked for a short time at Arrochar possibly at Ardgarten Forest which commenced planting in 1925 under David Spraggan but it seems he was fairly quickly transferred back to Aberdeenshire and Deer Forest which had started in operations in 1927 under A Ross. It was here that he met his first wife at Aden Estate.
Local forestry worker Gordon Thom recalls that Willie joined them as an under forester around 1932 or 1933 at Clashindarroch Forest but again he was moved very quickly as forester in charge to the Bin Forest in 1934. Following a tragic accident in which his wife was killed when crossing the A96 in front of the forestry house he and his young family moved to Durris Forest in 1938. Willie was in charge of the forest until end of 1946 when he made his move to Culbin Forest in 1947. It was from this time in Culbin that he tackled the most difficult areas of sand dune stabilisation and successfully completed the planting of almost all the sand dune areas by 1955. He initiated the early harvesting work and managed the forest until his retirement in 1969 completing over 42 years in the Forestry Commission.
Groups: Forestry Areas