"....a visitor after an absence of five or six months takes a few minutes to find his bearings, new streets and villas having multiplied rapidly."
The newspaper piece went on to describe a number of villas under various stages of construction, including the following:
"There is now nearing completion a double villa for John H Bennet Esq, which is of a style common in England but not often seen here. It is called the Queen Anne or half-timbered style. The lower storey is built of red Cleghorn bricks, with freestone dressings; and the upper storey, though brick beneath, shows a timber structure on the face, with spaces between filled in with harl colours. The roofs are covered with red tiles from Peake & Co.'s Tileries, Stoke on Trent and the chimneys are finished with red chimney cans from Alloa. Each house contains five rooms, kitchen, bath, hot and cold water and the usual offices. Messrs Farmer Bros have executed the mason work in a very efficient manner; and the joiner work by Mr Robert Suttie, Methil shows good quality workmanship. Messrs C. Neaves & Son have made a first-class job of the tiles, and the same may be expected of Mr John Knox who is just commencing the plaster work. Mr Andrew Walker is the plumber; Mr R.B. Forrester the painter; and Messrs A. and A.C. Dewar the architects."
This describes the houses named Eastfield and Mayfield at numbers 16 and 18 Leven Road (pictured above). Built for John Harper Bennet, an Edinburgh gas meter manufacturer, 'Mayfield' was named after the area of the city from which his family hailed. Bennet had trained as an architect and worked as such in Edinburgh and London before changing career to join the gas meter business of his father in 1886. Perhaps discovering the delights of Lundin Links as a fashionable summer resort, as many city professionals did at the time, John Bennet decided to invest in the expanding village. He became increasingly involved in local life and was a director of the Largo Gas Works. It was he who officially opened the facility in 1909, giving a speech about the history of gas supply in the area. Bennet was Managing Director of Alder & Mackay Ltd gas meter manufacturers, Edinburgh, who supplied the meter at Largo. In 1900 he and his family occupied Mayfield while renting out Eastfield to a Mrs C.R. Fleming.
Below is an advert from the 11 September 1931 Dundee Courier for the sale of Mayfield, with a description of the facilities at that time. Some further images of the properties follow further below.