From Punk Rock to Moon Buggies
Earlston's contribution to world history (or let's take a light-hearted, time travelling culture tour)
In 2015, there was a TV show called 'Six Degrees of Separation'. The show centred on finding a connection between six unlikely objects.
So, for a change this month, we'll look at the connections between six unlikely topics - punk rock, Caribbean sugar plantations, BAFTA TV Awards, New York book publishing, Bonnie Prince Charlie and Moon buggies - which are all linked to Earlston.
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Tom Davidson (https://tomdavidson.co.uk), the Earlston-based artist, has his gallery on Earlston High Street. The gallery is where his grandfather, Willie Alchin, had the village baker's shop.
The shop now doubles as Tom's studio and gallery, where he creates stunning lino-cut prints of local landscapes. His ability to capture light reflecting off the Leader river or sunshine piercing through the trees of Cowdenknowes Woods is a joy to behold.
But Tom also gained fame in another of the arts - music.
Tom studied at Carlisle University and joined The Limps, a punk rock band. The band released several singles and appeared on the John Peel Show in 1979.
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| The Limps(1) |
The band eventually broke up, and members drifted off to do their own thing.
Their music lives on, though. They appear on a recently released compilation album with bands like The Jam, The Stranglers, Siouxsie and the Banshees.
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| Gary Crowleys Punk and New Wave(2) |
There's a whole new audience that appreciates their music.
A film studio recently contacted the band asking to feature their track 'Someone I Can Talk To' on the closing credits of a new movie still in production. Its release date has not been announced, but look out for its title - 'The Snack Shack'.
Sugary snacks, like music, can hit the right note or, as they call it in the food industry, the bliss point. This is where the snack has just the right amount of sweetness. Any sweeter and it would be too sickly; any less, it wouldn't be sweet enough.
The bliss point makes you come back for more, which is great news for dentists and sugar producers alike.
John Redpath was an Earlston man who made his fortune through sugar refining in Canada.
John was the son of farm servants working on farms in the Earlston area. His father had the foresight to see the changes in store for farm workers due to the 'improvements' between 1760 and 1830.
The 'improvements' centred around better fertilisers, drainage, and more selective crops. As a result, farms became more productive and larger. The downside was that the farms needed a smaller workforce. Thousands of families left farming during this period in what became known as the lowland clearances.
John was fortunate in that he managed to get an apprenticeship with his uncle, a stone mason in Edinburgh. However, by the time John became a master mason, the Napoleonic Wars had just finished releasing thousands of soldiers, including stone masons from the engineering regiments, into the job market. Consequently, John decided to emigrate to Canada.
Within a few years, John had established a successful construction business. Seeing an opportunity and with enough spare capital, he constructed a sugar refinery in Montreal importing raw sugar from Caribbean sugar plantations.
John made his fortune from sugar. He returned to Scotland just once, but he took the time to visit Earlston when the Corn Exchange was being built. He presented the villagers with the clock in the Corn Exchange tower that chimes the hours as his lasting legacy.
In Canada, you can buy Redpath sugar in almost any grocery store or supermarket to satisfy your bliss point. Of course, not just humans enjoy sugar; horses also have a notoriously sweet tooth.
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| Redpath Sugar(3) |
Satisfying your sugar tooth and eating too much sugar will likely result in putting on weight, which in turn will slow you down. Presumably, the same is true for horses as well as humans.
Slow Horses was the name of a TV series starring Earlston High School former pupil Jack Lowden. Jack graduated from the prestigious Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in 2011. He was nominated for the BAFTA TV Award (2023) for Best Supporting Actor in his role of River Cartwright. The series follows a team of intelligence agents who serve as a dumping ground department of MI5 due to their career-ending mistakes.
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| Jack Lowden(4) |
The series is based on the book 'Slow Horses' by Mike Heron and published by Baskerville.
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| Slow Horses(5) |
And talking of publishers, Robert Carter was an Earlstonian who established a publishing company in New York.
Robert was born in Earlston in 1807 with an apparent unquenchable thirst for knowledge. At an early age, Robert showed his love for books when he watched an auctioneer dispose of the household effects of a neighbour.
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| Robert Carter(6) |
Included in the sale was a copy of Josephu's works, complete in one thick volume. When the auctioneer asked, 'How much am I offered for this?' Robert replied in a faint voice, 'Fourpence'. The auctioneer immediately handed the book to Robert, saying, "You shall have it, for you are the smallest customer I have had today'.
By age fifteen, Robert was holding night classes for local boys. Robert went on to attend university.
Years later, he gave up his teaching job in New York and opened a bookstore on the corner of Canal and Laurens Street in 1834. From selling books, he began to publish books at his New York book publishing company, Robert Carter and Brothers.
That first book no doubt changed Robert's life just as some of the books he published and sold would change the lives of others.
No wonder they say that the pen is mightier than the sword.
Of course, the most famous type of Scottish sword is the claymore, the weapon of choice for hundreds of years.
In 1745, when Bonnie Prince Charlie led his Jacobite army south towards London, the army camped at Fans, a few miles from Earlston. When the army marched southward again, it was discovered that a soldier had left his claymore behind.
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| Bonnie Prince Charlie(7) |
When news of the army's imminent arrival in Earlston, locals feared the Jacobites' notorious reputation for looting. Valuables were hidden wherever possible. Horses were hidden in a hollow below Caldies Hill known as 'Howe of Hope'. The exact spot had provided Covenanters a meeting place one hundred years before.
Caldies Hill is part of the old Earlston Golf Club.
On August 8th 1906, a meeting was held in the Smaller Exchange Hall to discuss the formation of an Earlston Golf Club. Twenty men attended, and the site chosen for the proposed course was Caldies Hill, owned by Lord Binning. The Chairman of the meeting, Rev N C Keith, advised the group that he had already gained permission from Lord Binning and his tenants.
On August 30th, Willie Park, a professional golfer and course designer, visited the site to draw up the plan for a nine-hole course.
The course was officially opened on Wednesday, November 7th 1907. However, the first competition occurred in October 1907 for the Silver Challenge Cup, presented by Issac Wallace, an Earlstonian who had emigrated to Australia. The Cup was won by Robert Lountain with a score of 79.
The game prospered in the village with both ladies and gentlemen sections. Two businesses, John McDonal, Saddler, and John Weatherston, Watchmaker, stocked clubs and balls.
Despite the best intentions, the Club was forced to close by the end of World War 2 due to a lack of members and funds.
However, the Club members were undeterred and boldly decided to open a golf course on the Moon.
To quote the Club's website (https://www.earlstongolfclub.com/):
With the purchase and restoration of the original golf course being unattainable at an Earlston Golf Club Committee Meeting in 2000, it was agreed to pursue the purchase of land to build a course on the Moon. This transaction was completed on November 3rd 2000, and initial planning was soon under way.
There are 18 Seas on the surface of the Moon, each of which has a Latin name which has been translated and given a Scottish Borders flavour to reflect the origins of the Club.
The holes on the Earlston Golf Club Moon Course were named to keep the authenticity of the course location whilst ensuring that the history and traditions of the Club are echoed in each hole.
One can assume that Moon buggies will be substituted for golf buggies.
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| Moon Buggy(8) |
Do you know of any unlikely topics or objects that are connected and linked with Earlston? Let us know in the Comments section below.
