Old Photograph Glencoe House Scotland

Old photograph of Glencoe House in the Highlands of Scotland. This Scottish mansion house was designed by Rowand Anderson, it was built in 1895 by Lord Strathcona for his wife, Isabella. Donald Alexander Smith, 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal was a Scottish born Canadian who became one of the British Empire's foremost builders and philanthropists. He became commissioner, governor and principal shareholder of the Hudson's Bay Company. He was president of the Bank of Montreal and with his first cousin, Lord Mount Stephen, co-founded the Canadian Pacific Railway. He was born 6 August 1820, on Forres High Street, in Moray. He was the second son of Alexander Smith and his wife Barbara Stuart, daughter of Donald Stuart of Leanchoil, Upper Strathspey, descended from Murdoch Stewart, 2nd Duke of Albany.His father, whose family had lived at Archiestown Cottage as crofters at Knockando, became a saddler at Forres after trying his hand at farming and soldiering. He emigrated to Lower Canada in 1838 to work for the Hudson's Bay Company, becoming a clerk for the organization in 1842.



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Old Photograph Public Library Fraserburgh Scotland

Old photograph of the Public Library in Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Fraserburgh Library was built in 1904 with funding from Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie was born in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland, and emigrated to the United States with his parents in 1848. Carnegie started work as a telegrapher, and by the 1860s had investments in railroads, railroad sleeping cars, bridges, and oil derricks. He accumulated further wealth as a bond salesman, raising money for American enterprise in Europe. He built Pittsburgh's Carnegie Steel Company, which he sold to J. P. Morgan in 1901 for $480 million. It became the U.S. Steel Corporation. After selling Carnegie Steel, he surpassed John D. Rockefeller as the richest American for the next couple of years.



All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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Old Photographs Forest Of Birse Castle Scotland

Old photograph of Forest of Birse Castle in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. This Scottish castle was built about 1600 for the Gordons of Cluny who owned the surrounding Forest of Birse. The Bishops of Aberdeen, who had a grant of the forest as early as 1242, also had a hunting seat in the forest, believed to be on the site of this castle. The Forest of Birse consisted of twenty-four towns, or farms, eighteen of which between 1574 and 1636 came into the hands of Gordon of Cluny. About 1610 this family, by building a castle, encroached upon the forest. The inhabitants of the other six farms claimed rights over the whole forest about 1640 they vindicated their rights by burning the castle and turning the tilled land into commonage and so held it for eighty years.

All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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Old Photograph Colzium House Scotland

Old photograph of Colzium House near Kilsyth, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. The present house dates from 1783 and was extended and modernised in 1861. The first building here was a large L plan tower house built by the Livingstons of Callendar in the mid 15th century to replace the ancient motte. The Civil War Battle of Kilsyth was fought just a mile to the east. A substantial hall house was added in 1575. The nearby castle was demolished by the third Viscount of Kilsyth in 1703, immediately prior to his accession to the title. The family lost the estate due to their Jacobite sympathies, and it then became the property of the Edmonstone family.



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Tour Scotland Video Kirkcaldy and District Pipe Band Highland Games Markinch Fife

Tour Scotland video of the Kirkcaldy and District Pipe Band at the Highland Games on ancestry visit to Markinch village in Fife, Scotland. Kirkcaldy and District Pipeband has existed for 30 Years, with various name changes, and is an active Grade 3 Band.

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