The above photograph will bring back memories for many who remember the shop at the west part of what was Defoe Place (now 3 Main Street), Lower Largo. Thomas Potter had the shop prior to Max Jurecki and this picture shows him standing at its door. There are some great details in this image. Note the advertising signs at each end of the premises - promoting 'Golden Virginia' hand rolling tobacco on the left and 'Wall's' ice cream on the right. Above the door is 'Player's Cigarettes' sign and to the right of the door an advert for 'Ilford' film.

This building housed the village Post Office for many years prior to this time, with three generations of the Welsh family running it. It was still the Post Office at the time of the photo, as can be seen from the sign to the left of the door. This was the standard old sign displayed at all Post Offices. The same one hung on the wall of Miss Bremner's Post Office in Lundin Links and is shown in more detail below. The Lower Largo Post Office later moved along to 91 Main Street.
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Postcards were clearly a big seller at this shop with an elaborate outdoor display board showcasing 'Valentine's' postcards. You can almost work out which vintage postcards are on show from the detail below from the photograph. There is a selection of novelty postcards in the lower right corner of the display (Scottie dog, lucky heather, etc). Hundreds of visitors must have purchased and sent postcards from here.

The Daily Record newspaper headline board has the enticing headline "Meet the Beatles in Person!" (dating the image to after they rose to fame in late 1962). The shop also had a Public Telephone (see sign above the door). I wonder whether that facility pre-dated the telephone box at the Orry. Finally to the right of the picture is a wonderful vintage car with the registration OSP 4. Does anyone recognise it?  Please share any memories of this shop if you can by commenting. Changes to the property over the years shown below.
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The black and white image above (from the book 'Seatoun of Largo' by Ivy Jardine) shows Thomas Jardine and his 'soor milk cairt' outside 32 Emsdorf Street (a more recent image of the same spot is also shown). The Jardine family moved to Largo from neighbouring Scoonie Parish in the early 1910s and sold milk, butter and eggs locally until the mid-1970s. Some of the time they seem to have been based at Largo Place and other times the family rented a house with stables and outbuildings on the north side of Largo Road next to the Police Station. This house was latterly named 'Kilrenny', which presumably was due to a connection with the Kilrenny Dairy near Anstruther. 

As the 'Largo Village Book' of 1932 states, many Largo farmers sold their milk to co-operative societies in West Fife. However, some farmers that had carts chose to supply the villages. Among them was Thomas Jardine (above) and Willie Arthur of Hillhouse Farm pictured below (image also from 'Seatoun of Largo'). According to the book, Arthur would blow a whistle to alert villagers to his arrival. When folks came out with their jugs, he would check they were cool enough and, if they were deemed to be too warm, he would send them away to the rinse the jugs out with cold water.
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Over time, the rules around the sale of milk would change and practices had to alter accordingly. From as early as the 1880s, it had been identified that milk could be a source of tuberculosis. However, it took many years for policies to be put in place to tackle this risk. A growing effort to improve the quality and safety of milk eventually led to the tuberculin testing of milk by the 1930s and a grading system. The newspaper item below from the 22 September 1934 St Andrews Citizen describes the East of Fife as "fortunate" to have locally produced graded milk. It also tells us that it was at this time that Kilrenny Dairy obtained a license to sell T.T. milk. ​If interested, you can read more about milk consumption and tuberculosis in Britain here.
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Kilrenny Dairy supplied milk widely across the East of Fife and supplied school milk for many years. Following the School Milk Act, passed in 1946, children were entitled to a third of a pint of milk a day. Many will remember school milk in bottles like the one below from Kilrenny Dairy. This zebra crossing design reads "REMEMBER - LOOK RIGHT, LOOK LEFT, BEFORE YOU CROSS. SAFETY FIRST!" Thus the milk bottles supplied both nutrition and road safety advice.

Notice that the milk bottle in the photograph below still refers to "T.T. milk" (i.e. milk that had been tuberculin tested). 
The category of T.T. milk was abolished in 1964 - placing the date of the bottle shown somewhere between the 1930s and 1960s (though I would guess 1950s). I remember milk still in bottles of this design in the 1970s, although with red rather than black printing and no mention of "T.T.". If you recall this milk bottle design (or other designs, especially from Kilrenny), please leave a comment.
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Kilrenny Dairy did have a Largo outpost, renting the stable block at Largo House for a spell. The advert below from the 24 June 1950 Fife Advertiser highlights that customers in Largo and Lundin Links can obtain their milk supplies from the Depot, Largo Road, Lundin Links (from Mr William Jack). Further below is a notice from 13 January 1954 Leven Mail which mentions Kilrenny Dairy vans serving Lundin Links, Lower Largo and Upper Largo.
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Looking at the empty and unused buildings of Largo Home Farm today, it's hard to imagine this as a bustling place of work and thriving community of residents. Yet for a couple of hundred years, this would have been a hive of activity and a home for estate employees and their families. It was the scene of births, deaths, marriages and all sorts of other occasions. Many of the residents were long term ones - living out decades of their lives there. Lots of children grew up on the farm and walked the short distance to Kirkton of Largo School for their education. Archives such as census records show the successive coachmen, foresters, game keepers, agricultural labourers, gardeners, dairy maids and others that lived on site. Examples of just a handful of these people are given below.

Eleven births were recorded in the register of births kept by midwife Margaret Bethune as taking place at either 'Largo Place' (the cottages at the south of the steading) or 'Eagle Gate Lodge' (the south lodge house) between 1853 and 1887. Three of those were the 11th, 12th and 13th children of John Sibbald and his wife.  The written record of child number 13 (a female born on 5 January 1872) is shown above. John Sibbald was a forester on the Largo estate. He was born in Largo in 1829. Several of his daughters worked at the Cardy Net Factory. In fact, his eldest daughter Maggie Campbell Sibbald was married to fisherman James Simpson by the Reverend David Malloch at Largo Place in 1872 - the same year as the birth of her youngest sister Janet shown above. A 14th child, William Bruce Sibbald, followed in 1875. 

William Bruce was also the name of the gamekeeper on the estate, who also resided at Largo Place at the time. It would appear that John Sibbald either named his youngest son after him or after the minister of the United Free Church in Upper Largo, who also shared the name. The birth of the first child of William Bruce the gamekeeper and his wife was also recorded in the register of Margaret Bethune - in 1875, the same year as the last of John Sibbald's children. Further Bruce children were also born at Largo Place, including twins (a boy and a girl) in 1884.

​Another family which saw several of their children born at the home farm was headed by Alexander Anderson. Alexander was initially a forester on the estate but became the 'Estate Overseer' by 1891 (see census entry below). The census extract below shows the four cottages of Largo Place listed beneath Largo House itself and the Coachman's House (unoccupied on the day of the census). The only residents of Largo House that day were the sewing maid and the laundry maid. Of the four cottages of Largo Place, one was unoccupied, one filled by the 'farm manager' and his large family, another was occupied by Anderson the overseer and the other by Robert Smith the gardener and his wife Annie.
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Robert Smith was a long serving gardener on Largo Estate who lived at Largo Place for decades. In 1886 he married Annie Greig Welsh, daughter of Lower Largo Postmaster Alexander Welsh. The pair were both extremely active in the Good Templars. Mr Smith was the 'Deputy Grand Chief Templar' of the Robinson Crusoe Lodge and Mrs Smith (pictured further below) was the 'Superintendent of the Juvenile Templars' at the time that the North East Fife Good Templar Guide of 1898 was published (see extract below). 
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Of the many events that took place at Largo Place, a couple of examples are given below. A Grand Floral Fete in 1899 was opened by architect of the Lundin Links Hotel, P.L. Henderson (advertised on the front page of the 17 August Leven Advertiser). In August of 1905 the Juvenile Templars were entertained at Largo House, assembling at Largo Place before marching to an estate field for games, tea and treats. See 17 August Leven Advertiser piece below. Various estate folks were present for the occasion, which surely took place thanks to the Smiths.  Robert Smith died at Largo Place in 1919. More on the Smiths and the Good Templars organisation to follow in the near future. 
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Leading on from the previous post, let's take a closer look at the layout and buildings of Largo Home Farm. The steading was arranged around a square courtyard with a byre at its centre. With some parts dating back to the late 18th century and with multiple alterations over the years, Largo Home Farm is a fine example of agricultural development through three centuries. Most of the buildings have served more than one function over time. Below is the detailed 1964 O.S. map of the farm, with numbering to show the main component buildings, plus a recent aerial view of the site. 

1. Building associated with the sheep dip
2. Horse mill (or horse gin)
3. West range of steading
4. Cart shed
5. Inner courtyard byre
6. East range of steading
7. Row of farm cottages
8. Farmhouse
​9. Sir Andrew Wood's Tower

Building 1 is a post-war structure that was clearly associated with the adjacent sheep dip. It is of brick construction and does not appear on earlier maps. Structure 2 is the horse mill or horse gin (short for horse engine house), which adjoins the north end of the west range of the steading. Horse gins were used on many farms to drive threshing mills. These generally consisted of a rotating wooden frame to which a horse was harnessed. As the horse pulled the frame round, it drove a shaft geared to the threshing mill next door. ​These took over from hand threshing from the 1780s. The engines were initially made of wood, and houses such as this one were built to protect the engine and the horses from the weather. This structure is typical of the area, with a polygonal roof (that originally would have been pantiled) supported on stone piers. The engine would have been removed when new technology took over in the late 18th century and the building would have been repurposed. Read more about the workings of a horse gin here and here. Below is the horse gin as it was in the mid 1970s. The roof has since collapsed.
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The horse-shoe shaped byre (5) can be seen below. The black and white photograph is from around 1975 while the colour one is present day. This unusually shaped single storey structure and seems to have contained a water pump. Its main purpose was to provide shelter for livestock, usually cows. Even in its dilapidated state, it is an attractive and characterful building with its pantiled roof, dark whin rubble walls and golden sandstone window dressings.  The 1854 O.S. map (further below) indicates that this was not always in its later horse shoe shape but earlier consisted of a north edge and a small square building in the south east corner. It was built-up into the horse shoe arrangement before 1893. 

The east range of the steading (6) is pictured above as it is today (with much of the roof collapsed) and as it was circa 1975. It had high arched entrances at either end and was clearly designed to accommodate large pieces of farm equipment. The row of farm cottages (7) are shown below at circa 1975 (before the preservation work was carried out on Wood's Tower), in 1989 and as they are now. ​These dwellings for farm workers were located to the south of the main steading, set back from the working area and closer to the gardens and to Largo House. The main farmhouse (8) was located further east. It is shown in the previous post. Coming in the next part - the people who lived and worked at Largo Home Farm.

Largo Home Farm was the farm associated with Largo House that now lies in a largely derelict state. Situated to the north west of Largo House, the Home Farm is adjacent to Sir Andrew Wood's Tower (seen to the left in the above aerial photograph). "Home farm" was the widely-used term used for the farm within an estate which provided produce for the estate owner. An estate may have had many farms within its boundaries, most of which would be rented out to tenant farmers. However, the home farm was managed as a source of food and resources for the 'big house'. It was also often where the estate horses were kept. The home farm would be close to the landowner's house, as in this case. The Largo estate owned around a dozen farms, including Lundin Mill, Buckthorns, Chesterstone, Pitcruvie and Bonnyton. The extent of the Home Farm (also referred to as Largo Mains) is shown in the centre of the 1866 map below.  

It can be assumed that Largo House has long had farm buildings of some sort to support its occupants. The oldest surviving building is the doocot that stands to the left of the access road to home farm. Doocot is the Scots name for a dovecot or pigeon house. These were used as nesting places for doves or pigeons and could contain hundreds of nesting boxes or ‘pigeon holes’. The birds were an important source of fresh meat in the days when it was a challenge to keep livestock over the winter. Their feathers and droppings were also utilised for pillows and fertiliser, respectively. Read more about Fife's doocots here. 

The Largo Home Farm Doocot dates to the late 17th century and, like many others in Fife, is of the 'lectern' style. Note the south facing mono-pitched roof (now collapsed), the crow-stepped gables (where pigeons could perch) and the 'rat course' external ledge to prevent rats climbing the walls to access to doocot to steal eggs. The condition of the doocot has deteriorated noticeably over the last few decades. Below are a pair of photos taken from the same spot - on the left is a 1989 view and on the right an image captured in 2020. In thirty years, vegetation has taken hold within the roofless structure (much like what has happened to Largo House itself). The 1989 photo also shows the roof of the horse mill in the background to the right of the doocot. The horse mill structure has now collapsed (more on that later). 

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Canmore describes the listed Farmhouse at Largo Home Farm (pictured below as it was in 1975) as 18th century with the following description:

"2 storey, 3 bay house, harled with painted ashlar dressings. Glazed central door and enlarged windows to ground floor. Original first floor glazing. Pantiled roof, straight skews with simply moulded skew putts to front and crowsteps to rear at north east gable. End stacks. Single storey wing to right, rubble with droved ashlar dressings and pantile roof. Modern addition at rear."

The farmhouse is located on the far right of the home farm group of buildings (see 1854 O.S. map further below), which also include a distinctive horseshoe-shaped byre, a row of farm cottages, a horse mill and other steading buildings. In part two - a photo tour of these buildings with further description of how they were once used.