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Grandholm Mills
1715 The dinner hour, workers crossing the bridge over the River Don.
The history of the mills in Woodside has gone through prosperous and bad times with several being closed in the mid-1800s and subsequently reopened towards the end of the century. The success especially of the paper and cloth mills of the area has provided work for many generations of Woodsiders.
A linen and cloth factory moved to the Grandholme mills site in mid-18th century from Gordon Mills and was taken over by James and John Crombie in 1859. J&J Crombie went on to produce the famous worldwide Crombie cloth at the Grandholme Mill, leading to the long association between Woodside and the fabric. The mill at one point employed up to 3000 people.
J&J Crombie were included on a list of government suppliers and one tenth of all coats worn by British officers of the First World War were made with the Crombie cloth. By World War II 467 miles of the cloth was being produced at the Grandholme mill per year.
By 1960 Grandholm was the largest supplier of tweed in the UK and also produced silk, wool, cashmere and yarns. Sadly the business has now been moved away from the Woodside area to the Borders.
Clearing the Line to Aberdeen in a Snowstorm
2202 A postcard image showing workers clearing railway tracks of snow. This scene is likely following the great snowstorm of 1908.
In the last week of December of that year, Aberdeen had such severe snowfall that it was cut off from the rest of the country by rail, and residents had shortages of bread and milk as carts were unable to make their usual deliveries.
Snow built up in the streets in banks of up to 6 feet in height. The council engaged over 600 men in the city-wide task of clearing the snow. Treasure 36: Aberdeen City Libraries' First Book Sale, 24 February 1979
2327 National Libraries Day has been held every February since 2011 to celebrate and raise awareness of libraries, library staff and their communities all over the UK. It is an opportunity for libraries to showcase and promote what they have to offer and to attract as many visitors as possible to local libraries.
This month our selection from the Library archive brings the focus to a Library event the likes of which has never been seen before or since in Aberdeen City Libraries. The photograph shows the queue for the first ever Library book sale held in the Ballroom of the Music Hall on Saturday 24 February 1979, when well over a thousand people swarmed through the doors to grab a bargain. The Press and Journal covered the event with the headline: "Bonanza Day for Bookworms; bargain hunters pack the Music Hall".
In September 1978 the Aberdeen District Council's library committee agreed to a recommendation from City Librarian Peter Grant to hold a sale of more than 30,000 books which had been withdrawn from stock for various reasons. There was also considerable duplication of stock following local government re-organisation in 1975 when Aberdeen inherited six former county branch libraries.
Books were divided into three categories: Children's, Adult Fiction and Non-Fiction (including reference books) and prices were kept low at 20p for fiction books and non-fiction titles slightly more at 50p.
Best sellers included children's books purchased by play groups, out of date encyclopaedias and Whittaker's Almanacs, and bound volumes of National Geographic Magazine. By the end of the day, the event was deemed an overwhelming success, selling over 13,000 books and raising more than £3645 for the purchase of new stock.
The hard work and dedication of the Library staff was recognised by the Convener of the Library Committee Councillor Henry Rae who said "It turned out to be a resounding success and this was achieved by the dedication of the staff".
The Culter Mills Paper Company, 1981
4287 Former Mill workers' cottages, now Council owned. Nos. 1-6 St. Peters' Terrace.
This image is one of fifteen from a photographic survey of the exterior of Culter Paper Mills and nearby Kennerty Mill undertaken by John A. Souter in the summer of 1981. John kindly donated colour slides of these photographs to Aberdeen City Libraries.
The early history of the Culter Mills Paper Company can be read in the article 'Paper-making on Deeside (1750-1932)' by Alexander A. Cormack in The Deeside Field (sixth number, 1933) pages 36-45. This can be accessed at Aberdeen City Libraries. 10-16 George Street (no. 12)
4344 A photograph showing buildings at 10-16 George Street in around 1986 or 1987.
This image is one of a series taken by Aberdeen City Council to record buildings prior to the redevelopment of the area and construction of the Bon Accord shopping centre.
In order from right to left there is the Paige Plus clothes shop, a doorway labelled number 12 and the Rubber Shop at 12-16 George Street. The doorway would have led to the floors above street level. The shops have closed down and been emptied by the time of this image.
A Socialist Workers Party poster that appears to concern the disease AIDS has been attached to the window of the Rubber Shop. In 1986-87, HIV/AIDS was a severe and still emergent health issue.
These buildings were shortly afterwards demolished to make way for the Bon Accord Centre. Treasure 46: The Aberdeen Herald
217 When the first weekly issue of The Aberdeen's Journal was published by James Chalmers in January 1748 who would have guessed it would still be in production today (admittedly with several changes of title and ownership) as The Press and Journal.
The monopoly of The Aberdeen Journal, as it soon became, remained almost unchallenged throughout the eighteenth century but the nineteenth century saw the publication of several competing newspapers. Most of these were short-lived but included The Aberdeen Herald, and General Advertiser for The Counties of Aberdeenshire, Banffshire, and Kincardineshire, which was published between 1832 and 1876.
We hold the first copy of this weekly newspaper in our collections. It was printed and published by George Cornwall, and was issued on Saturday 1 September 1832. It succeeded an earlier paper called The Aberdeen Chronicle which had been in production since 1806. The Aberdeen Journal was seen then as politically neutral but the Herald is described as Whig-Radical and its opening advertisement states "In fact, the chief object of The Aberdeen Herald will be to obtain a cheap, efficient, and patriotic system of Government".
Since the Herald was published on a Saturday while the Journal appeared on Wednesday, it was able to include articles which would have been old news by the following Wednesday and could also provide updates to news from earlier in the week.
The newspaper cost 7d which was far beyond what an ordinary person could pay and restricted readership to the wealthy. This high cost was a result of taxes imposed by the Stamp Act of 1712 which was not abolished until 1855. Papers could then be bought for 1d and there was freedom to produce mass-circulation newspapers with improved text layout.
The front pages of newspapers, even as recently as the early 1900s, did not contain news stories but were filled with adverts - business, theatrical events, shipping, property and public notices. The issue of The Aberdeen Herald for 21 April 1866 contained an advert explaining the change of name for the town of Inverurie. Local historian, Dr Douglas Lockhart, provides the following account of the town's name change.
The market town of Inverurie was one of the fastest growing places in Aberdeenshire during the mid-nineteenth century when its population increased from 735 in 1821 to 2524 in 1871. Many factors contributed to rapid growth at this time including good communications, initially by turnpike roads and the Aberdeenshire Canal to nearby Port Elphinstone, and from the mid-century it lay astride the railway line between Aberdeen, Elgin and Inverness.
Further advantages were the extensive agricultural surroundings, markets and successful local businesses. Surprisingly Alexander Smith in A New History of Aberdeenshire, which was published in 1875, has little to say about the transformation of the town. However, he wrote a lengthy paragraph to describe how 'INVERURIE was, in former times, written Inneraury, Ennerawrie, and Hennerawie, and latterly Inverury' and he notes that the name meant "the confluence of the river of the margin".
On 5 February 1866 the Council met to discuss what appears to have become a growing problem - mail was being sent to Inveraray in Argyllshire because Inverury was not listed by the Post Office as a Post Town. The solution was simple: "return to the ancient spelling of the Burgh as Inverurie and to memorialise the Postmaster General to have it set down on the Lists as a Post Town". The Postmaster agreed to the name change and the scene was set on 19 April for the Council to discuss advertising the new arrangements. The wording of an advertisement was approved and it was decided to place it in the Edinburgh Gazette, Aberdeen Journal, Aberdeen Free Press, Aberdeen Herald and Banffshire Journal and "to endeavour to get the Railway Company to alter the spelling of the Station in their Tables".
Inverury officially became Inverurie the following day and on 21 April The Aberdeen Herald announced the change of name in the advertising columns of its front page. The Banffshire Journal in addition to printing the advertisement also published a glowing report on building activity in the burgh and noted that "within the memory of living inhabitants [the town] has been thoroughly regenerated".
Aberdeen Local Studies holds files of many local newspapers on microfilm, including the Aberdeen Herald and the Free Press. A digitised partial file is also available on the British Newspaper Archive which can be freely consulted online in the Central Library using your library card. Treasure 82: Linksfield Library
294 Did you know there were once plans to build a Branch Library on the corner of School Road and King Street? In the Library Archive we hold a set of drawings showing the proposed library, prepared by A.B. Gardner, City Architect.
In January 1938 the Sub-Committee accepted the proposal for a new library building constructed in white dressed Kemnay granite and referred the scheme for final approval to the Town Council.
Unfortunately, due to a shortage of construction workers in the City, the scheme was deferred and the outbreak of World War II further delayed the plans. Linksfield Branch Library did not open until December 1975, several hundred yards south of the original School Road site, within the newly constructed Linksfield Academy.
Linksfield Academy closed in 2002 due to falling numbers and its pupils transferred to St Machar Academy. The building was occupied by the public library, community centre and swimming pool, all of which remained open following the school closure.
Linksfield Public Library closed on 30 September 2010 after which Linksfield Academy was demolished to make way for the new Aquatics Centre on King Street.
View the Treasures from our Collections interactive exhibition on the touchscreen to find out more about the history of Linksfield Library.
Treasure 122: Aberdeen Charters and Armorial Seals
345 For one of our final treasures we are travelling further back in time than we have done previously, to look at possibly the oldest items in Aberdeen City Libraries' collections. These are a collection of three charters dating from the 15th and 16th centuries, two of which have their wax seals still attached. They are written in Latin on parchment and describe the conveyance of land or rights from one party to another within the burgh of Aberdeen. The earliest of our charters dates from 13 March 1567 and is a charter respecting the granting by Gilbert Kintoir, senior, burgess of Aberdeen, of 'one half net of the ly fords fishings in the water of the river Dee' in favour of John Arthour, another burgess of Aberdeen. Our next charter is dated 10 May 1597 and is a charter of feuferm granted by Provost, Baillies, etc. of the Burgh of Aberdeen, in favour of William Jaffray, burgess. Our last charter is much later and dates from 1673. It is a charter of James Raite of Findlastoun.
Also on display are two replicas of Aberdeen City's 1430 armorial seal. One, a silver pendant, and the other a replica wax seal, both made by Malcolm Appleby in limited editions for the council in 1979. The permission to use the design of a shield bearing the Royal Tressure of Scotland (parallel lines around the shield with fleur-de-lis), and lion supporters on the 1430 arms, was given to the burgh of Aberdeen by King James I (1406-1437) in acknowledgement of the city's role as one of the four burghs (along with Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee) who had elected to pay the ransom for his liberty from captivity under King Henry VI of England. James had been captured by the English in infancy, and held as a prisoner of Henry V and Henry VI for 18 years.
To learn more about the fascinating evolution of Aberdeen's coat-of-arms, have a browse in the Treasures from our Collections interactive exhibition. Acts of the Harbour Committee - The Life Boat.
437 A notice detailing regulations for the management of Aberdeen's life boat. The regulations are taken from two acts of the Harbour Committee dating from 7th January 1811 and 13th March 1815.
The regulations detail the rights and responsibilities of Captain Nicol, then acting as the sole management and direction of the boat. He is empowered to collect dues from the other boats using the harbour and to offer extra financial reward to life boat volunteers in instances of danger.
He must also keep the boat, its apparatus, and the launching slip in good working order at all times and have it launched and ready to go in stormy conditions.
The broadside was complied from the aforementioned acts of the Harbour Board by William Carnegie and was printed and published by D. Chalmers and Co. Act for regulating and augmenting the Dues payable to the Pubilic Metters, at the Shore
481 This Act of Aberdeen's town council regards the regulation of dues payable to 'metters' - seemingly council employed officials that work with goods coming through the port. The Act dates to 3rd July 1797.
A council commissioned committee surveyed the operation of Aberdeen's Lime and Coal Metters. Having conducted a year long survey on dues from 'Grain, Meal, Coals, Cinders, Bark and Salt' coming by way of the shore, the committee recommended that the metters should receive a pay rise. This was unanimously agreed by the council.
The text is appended by Alex R. Carnegie, likely a council clerk. |