Royal visit to Banffshire
100 Years Ago
Macduff Sunday school outing – The children attending the Parish Church Sunday School held their annual picnic on Saturday. The children, to the number of between 300 and 400, met at the hall in Market Street, and headed by Piper Macrae and his little boy as drummer, marched in procession to the station, where they travelled to King Edward. A field was kindly lent by Mr Duncan, Balchers, where tea and other refreshments were served, and games engaged in. Prizes were awarded to the winners. The neighbouring farmer as usual contributed supplies of milk. During the afternoon, many of the parents of the children visited the ground. The picnic was successful and the children returned home by the 8 o’clock train.
50 Years Ago
Queen will visit Banffshire – The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh are to visit the counties of Banffshire, Moray and Nairn, this summer when they come to Scotland for their summer holidays at Balmoral. It was announced on Wednesday that after the tour of Northern Ireland on August 8 and 9, the Queen and the Duke will sail to Scotland in the royal yacht, Britannia, arriving on August 14, and they will spend the whole of that day touring in the three counties. The royal party will land at Macduff and will proceed via Banff, Cullen and Buckie, meeting the provosts and councils at each of the four places and will have coffee in Buckie and lunch in Elgin. She will be accompanied in Banffshire by Colonel Sir George W. Abercromby, Forglen House, Lord Lieutenant of Banffshire. Among the duties the Queen will perform will be the presentation of a standard to No. 120 Squadron, Coastal Command, at the RAF Station, Kinloss. A new officers’ mess is being built at Kinloss and it seems very likely that it will be opened by the Queen either on this visit or later in August. At the end of the day’s tour, the Queen and Duke will join their children at Balmoral, and, on August 19 the Queen will present new colours to the 3rd Battalion The Gordon Highlanders (TA) at Balmoral.
25 Years Ago
Double good fortune for the carers – The respite service which is to come into operation in the Banff, Macduff, Portsoy and Turriff areas at the end of next month has been given a big double boost this week. The organisers are now convinced that the Deveron District Respite Care Service will be launched, providing the first-ever "care for carers" scheme in this area. The first boost to the local scheme came when Age Concern (Scotland) announced that they are to make a donation of £100 towards helping administrative costs. This was followed by an offer from Grampian Health Board to provide office accommodation at 22 Fife Street, Banff, the headquarters of the local health council. Steering committee secretary Mrs Morag Davies, who first put forward the respite idea, is "over the moon" at the developments. "This is just the start we wanted," she told the ‘Banffshire Journal’, "and we are also hopeful of financial backing from other national charities. But, of course, the steering committee will have to decide on fund-raising efforts of our own as money will be needed to ensure the service is adequately managed. The offer of office accommodation in Banff is a big boost for us and this will be the centre of the respite service activities." The Manpower Services Commission is also expected to announce very soon the backing for the scheme – which will offer relief to those who look after the disabled, sick and elderly in their homes as well as single parents. The respite service team will consist of eight people – six care assistants, one clerical and one coordinator. "The trade unions have given their support and we expect the MSC to give us the go-ahead to allow the service to start at the end of August," added Mrs Davies. "We have no doubts about the need for the caring service and we will shortly be compiling a list of those we can help."