Some more of Mum’s memories, again of time spent helping her Dad.
On a Saturday, for Dad, it was country delivery day. He would deliver whisky to outlying golf courses.
I remember delivering to Craigend Castle. This was a private dwelling at this time; latterly it was a tearoom for the zoo. I couldn’t get out of the cab for fear of trampling on rabbits.
Somehow Dad usually managed to end up at Andrew Bruce’s. He had a wife, Jean, and daughter, Margaret. Andrew was a forester at Craigton and they lived in a cottage on the main road next to the school. He always called in there and got a cup of tea and usually a freshly baked scone.
He would not take tea anywhere else, but he enjoyed his blether with Andrew.
They usually finished at lunchtime and that was the time the lorries were washed and serviced. Then Nell, the bearded collie, was brought over to the garage from the house and the hunt for rats would begin.
I remember one time the rat ran out and Dad had a spade in his hand ready to hit it. Unfortunately, he hit Nell on the nose and she ran away squealing. He was so upset because she would have got the rat on her own.
The rats came across the Allander Burn from the paper mill. The men would throw away some of their lunch pieces, which fed the rats, and I presume if they smelled food, for example cheese, they crossed the river to the garage.
After the rat hunt, Dad would bring the lorry boys over for lunch. This would be chips and egg, which Dad would make. Mum cleared out, going to Maryhill for Sunday dinner.
I remember one lad saying, “You have a cloth on the table and you pass the plate of bread around. We are lucky if we have newspaper on the table and the bread never reaches a plate; we just grab what we can.”
It was the grandmother who brought that family up.
After lunch, Dad would have them working in the garden or painting the shed, etc., until about 4pm. That is when the baths opened and they could go there for a shower.
One of the lads said that if they didn’t do that, they would end up stealing so that they might get caught and end up in a young offenders’ unit, where they were fed and looked after for the weekend.
Craigachan 