"chittering bite". This was supposed to stop our teeth chattering
with cold after leaving the water. We also had the occasional trips
to Morrison's Haven harbour when the coal boats were in. On one
occasion I was lucky enough to persuade a Dutch captain to let me
on board to see over his boat. From the harbour we could watch the
sailing regattas held off the beach at Prestongrange. I can still
remember the yacht Irene owned by a local miner, Mr Reid, and another
called the Primrose, Across the road from the harbour was the "Grange
Pit". Mr Brown, whose wife was a close friend of my mother, worked
in what I believe was known as the pump house. When Mr Brown was
working on the back-shift, his son Tom and I would go to the pit
with his piece. We would go through the "woods" to the back of the
pit where the pit bogies were left at the top of a slope. We rode
the bogies down the slope until they slowed down on the level near
the pump house. One final memory is of the "war" between the Coast
Line Bus Company and Scottish Motor Traction. We had obviously heard
our parents talking about an attempted takeover of the Coast route
by the S.M.T. so we decided to lend our support to the Coast Line
buses. A stone wall divided Summerlee from the road and for days
the wall was covered with boys for hours on end cheering when a
Coast Line bus came into view and booing the S.M.T. when they appeared.
The Coast Line buses and corporation tramcars up to then had been
the usual means of transport to Edinburgh, As it happened, the Coast
Line gave up the route while the tramcars left the scene not many
years after. |
