Many early photographs of the Lundin Golf Club House show a wooden fence between the club house and the first tee and starter's hut.  This was not there at the time that the club house was first opened.  The earlier photo below from the day of the official opening shows the absence of the fence.  Helpfully, a short newspaper report from 25 July 1896 (St Andrews Citizen) pins down the timing of the erection of the fence...

"A rustic fence, consisting of undressed tree trunks varnished, has been put around the new club house."

The same newspaper notes that...

"For the convenience of lady golfers, joiners are presently engaged in putting up a temporary club-house at Lundin Links.  It is understood that a more substantial building will be put up in next year."

​Indeed, a more substantial club house for the ladies was built in 1897 and was subsequently moved in 1909 to its present site.

​If you know when the 'rustic fence' was removed from the Lundin Golf Club, please comment.  I'd also be interested to see a photograph of the temporary ladies club house mentioned or the present building on its original site.

The above advert is a brief postscript to the earlier posts on W.M. Stebbing and the business that he established in Lundin Links which was continued by his son.  This advert dates from 13 July 1949 when William Stebbing still ran the business and it was featured in the Leven Mail.  Park Knowe is the residence attached to the shop and the phone number '74' remains unchanged to this day.  The present Lundin Links Pharmacy can be reached on 320274 - phone numbers becoming longer over the years with prefixes added at different stages.

David Lindsay was born in Lundin Mill on 14 October 1854, delivered by midwife Margaret Bethune (see entry above from her record of births - number 44).  His father Robert was a handloom weaver and sometime seaman and his mother was Christian Kellock. The family lived in a cottage in 'Emsdorf' and, by 1871, a seventeen-year-old David was described as an 'apprentice mason' in the census.  However, a decade later, the 1881 census noted David as 'formerly mason (disabled)'.  

In 1883 David embarked upon a new career as a grocer (a trade that one of his brothers had earlier carried out in the village) and he married Isabella Horne in December 1884.  By the 1891 census they were at 'Brae Grocer's Shop and House' (likely on Hillhead Street) and had started a family.  During the 1890s, the family's lives changed significantly, as Lundin Mill itself went through dramatic growth.  

​The grocery seems to have prospered (see advert from 1893 below featured in the St Andrews Citizen and also from 1896 from the Fife Free Press) and the family moved into a large house named "The Mount" at the east end of Woodlands Road.  The choice of house name is interesting, as it seems it may have been named after the well-know "Sir David Lindsay of The Mount". This namesake was a herald and poet who lived between around 1490 and 1555, whose family home was The Mount outside Cupar.

In 1896, David Lindsay's business moved to newly-built premises at the corner of Emsdorf Street and Hillhead Street. Now the location of the local doctor's surgery, this building was originally a grocer's shop. Later know as Turbayne's, Leishman's and Croll's, this shop was originally 'Lindsay's'.  David Lindsay's application for a license for his new shop was reported in the St Andrews Citizen of 31 October 1896...

"...Lindsay had been a mason to trade, but through an unfortunate accident had been compelled to seek some other means of livelihood.  Thirteen years ago he had started an unlicensed grocer's shop, which he had conducted to the best of his ability. Lundin LInks was fast growing into a fashionable and popular summer resort, and would soon be one of the best resorts on the east coast.  The present premises were inadequate for the increasing trade, and Mr Lindsay thought it a good opportunity to ask for a license for new premises. A Post Office had been opened this month, and all the trains now stop at the station, while many of the houses on Mr Gilmour's feus were being remodelled, and in some cases reconstructed."

The application was supported by a petition signed by 110 owners or tenants from Lundin Mill and another signed by 58 regular visitors to the village.  The license was granted. The new licensed premises in the developing resort did well and the advert from 1903 in the Dundee Evening Telegraph (below) speaks of "high-class provisions" and a "list of furnished houses and apartments". Lindsay was present at the opening of the new Lundin Links Hotel in 1900 and presumably became well-connected in the area.  His elder brother Andrew was a school headmaster in Cowdenbeath and was close friends (and golfing partners) with another grocer William Bethune - both being born around the same time in Lundin Mill.

Interestingly, the Lindsays sold "The Mount" in 1901 to Alexander Philp and moved to live above the grocer shop at the flat known then, as now, as St Helen. There is a suggestion that the upper floors of living accommodation were added at a later date on top of the original single storey shop. Actually, this seems highly likely as the original shop was probably built in proportion to the mirroring single storey shop on the other corner of Hillhead and Emsdorf, it would explain why the Lindsays moved from 'The Mount' when they did and also close inspection of the building (see image below) shows it to be distinctly two-tone!

​David Lindsay diversified his business interests and, around the turn of the century, began a boot and shoe shop (see above advert), in which one of his daughters worked. He owned multiple shops and houses in the village by 1905 (including Hillcrest and Nellfield behind St Helen on Hillhead Street). David died on 5 July 1914 from a heart attack while still running the grocer shop.  He was found dead in the water closet at his home, St Helen. He was only 59 but he had lived through an eventful life, beginning when Lundin Mill was a quiet village of weavers and ending after it had transformed into the fashionable resort of Lundin Links. Incidentally, only 5 days later, on 10 July 1914, another Lundin Links shopkeeper passed away - James Gulland the tailor and clothier.  Mrs Isabella Lindsay outlived her husband by 25 years, passing away in 1939.

The above postcard is interesting for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, it is mislabelled.  The caption says 'Crescent Road' but it is of course the neighbouring Victoria Road.  I'm not certain when Victoria Road was officially given its name but it must have been at some point between the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria (in 1897 - the time when the very first houses on the street were completed) and her death in 1901, or very soon afterwards.  The second thing that strikes me about the image is the complete absence of any signs of life - no people, no vehicles, etc.  It seems eerily quiet.

At this time, the metal railings were still in place in the front gardens and there were no driveways.  The photograph also pre-dates the road down to the Sports Club and the play park.  Some of the houses on this stretch of the street retain their original names.  Back in the time of this photo, from the top of Victoria Road (at the Leven Road junction) the house names were: Montpelier; Middleton; Treaton; Greystone Lea; Ardmay; Glenisla; Hazelrig; and Edzell (with its gable end closest to the camera).

The grassy area in the foreground would have been well-used though. Football matches and fetes would have been held there.  Also, possibly Scout or Guide camps, or other groups.  In fact the postcard above (posted c1930) has a message on its reverse side as follows: "Having great weather here at Camp. I have not much to say but this is a post to let you know I have not forgotten you."  Perhaps this postcard was selected because the camp was right on this spot?

When William Stebbing moved his Chemist business from Bo'ness to Lundin Links at the end of 1947, the two shops in West Lothian were taken over by Boots.  Meanwhile, the Stebbing family established themselves in their new village. However, after only a few years, in 1952, William died suddenly at the age of 44.  Remarkably, his son Alex, then only 15, decided to set out on the long road to finish school and train as a pharmacist.  He qualified in 1959 and served an apprenticeship with T.W. Buchanan of Leven. During the intervening years the Lundin Links pharmacy was run by a series of locums.

Taking the long-term view proved worthwhile, as Alex eventually took up the helm at Lundin Links, retaining his father's name above the door, and remaining dispensing chemist there until 1995, when he retired.  The photograph below appeared in the East Fife Mail at the time of Alex Stebbing's retirement.  Although that marked the end of an era and the conclusion of a remarkable story, the pharmacy business continues in the same premises to this day.  Elements of the shop's early twentieth century origins can still be seen.  The entrance for example still looks very much like it always did.

The name of Stebbing is well-known in Lundin LInks, particularly in relation to the Pharmacy which has stood at the corner of Emsdorf Street and Links Road for more than a century.  In the early decades of its existence the Pharmacy traded under the name of A. Hogg.  Although Andrew Hogg died in 1937, the shop retained his name until 1947.  It was in December 1947 that William McAllan Stebbing took over the Lundin Links Pharmacy - moving from Bo'ness, where he had been in business for sixteen years.  A splendid series of adverts ran in the Bo'ness Journal during the 1940s for the shops he had there - many focussing on the optician part of the business.  The artwork reflects the era and makes reference to popular pastimes such as dancing, tennis and visiting the cinema or theatre.

The move from Bo'ness to Lundin Links was an opportunity to move from an industrial area to the cleaner seaside air of a popular holiday destination. As the Bo'ness Journal of 17 October 1947 noted, the new business was "in a delightful corner of the Kingdom" and offered a "change of air" to their young son. A keen golfer, William had played at Lundin Links representing West Lothian Golf Club.  And so the name of W.M. Stebbing went up above the Lundin Links Pharmacy, beginning a new era - more of which to come in the next post.

Congratulations to the Lundin Ladies Golf Club on reaching the 125th anniversary of their formal constitution.  There was a lovely feature in the East Fife Mail this week (30 March 2016), which included the photograph below. The newspaper article suggests that this image dates to around 1897 (when the club house was first opened on its original site adjacent to the men's course).  However, closer inspection shows this was in fact taken at the club house's present site with the 'Fir Park' trees in the background.  It was actually the official opening of the new course at Standing Stane Park in 1910. Careful comparison with the second photograph (of Harry Gilmour driving the first ball at the opening event on 15 April 1910) shows not only the same trees outlined in the background, but the same ladies with the same outfits looking on. 

Golf was played by ladies in Lundin Links prior to 1891.  The previous year, such was the demand for a separate place for women to play golf, that a 20-hole course was laid out to the east of the men's course.  The Dundee Courier of 26 August 1890 ran the brief piece below at the time.  This early course was set out by a John George Glover.  As the article suggests, Glover was based in London, however, he was a regular visitor to Lundin Links and was involved with the Lundin Golf Club at the time.  He was the son of the Scottish businessman Thomas Glover, who established a large gas meter company in the 1840s.  His son John worked for the firm, which had a significant presence in Scotland. The present ladies course was of course laid out by James Braid.