Working for the Church: Memories from the last 40 years

A Brighter Church

One of the biggest projects undertaken by voluntary labour was the scraping and cleaning of the church pews. This entailed removing the dark paint from all the pews a particularly messy job to bring them back to a natural wood colour. Volunteer squads of men and women undertook this task over many weeks, scraping off the old paint, cleaning up the resultant mess, washing the floors, and finally coating the pews with a clear wax covering. The wood around the organ pipes and the front of the balconies grained professionally by Mr Jardine, painter, free of cost.

All this work, coupled with the removal of the coloured glass from the windows, brought a brighter and fresher look to the whole interior of the church.

A dance was held to mark the end of this long and arduous task. It was aptly named
" The Scrapers' Ball !"

The Tower

The building known as the Tower was at one time oart of the Prestonpans Soap Works property. Although badly in need of internal structural repairs it was purchased by the church for (£40) ? Then under the guidance of Jimmy Scott and the late Alex Taylor a squad of men set to work to make it into a useful building for church purposes. The whole inside was gutted until only the four walls remained. Work was organised over many weeks, the volunteers turning up in regular rotas helping with structural work, joinery, electrical installation, painting and general labouring etc.

When the job was finished we possessed a useful building consisting of an upper floor room, a ground floor room, small kitchen and toilet facilities. Presumably because of its outside shape it became known as "The Tower".