Fife and Scotland - the offbeat perspective

In current times, Fife is the smallest administrative region within a devolved Scottish Parliament of the United Kingdom and has a total population of about 350,000 people. There are no cities in Fife but the region lies centrally between Edinburgh, Dundee and Perth. More than a third of the population live in the four main towns of Dunfermline, Kirkcaldy, Glenrothes and St Andrews. This section describes these four communities.

Kirkcaldy is located on the south coast of Fife Region and whose northern border is steadily progressing towards the Soirthern border of the regional administrative capital of Glenrothes and where some form of merger is likely in the future. It’s the largest town in Fife with a population of about 49,000 people and where, for a brief time, the population rose to exceed 53,000.

According to some, Kirkcaldy (pronounced Kirk-Caudy) derives it's unusual name is from Pictish language referring to a ‘hard fort’ although part may have come from the description of a larger area formerly called Kirkaladunt. From early times, it became known as the ‘Land Toun’ (Long Town) on account of its long High Street and community buildings following the shape of the coastline. It's a conurbation in its own right having swallowed up smaller villages during its continual expansion and including places like Smeaton and Dysart, the latter reknowned for its strong Dutch connections in the past.

In 1304, the Abbot of Dunfermline petitioned King Edward I of England for the establishment of a weekly ‘farmer’s market’ and an annual carnival and fair. This was necessary since Scotland was largely a land under English occupation in 1304.

The petition was granted and the annual ‘Links Market’ still remains as the largest ‘street fair’ in Europe. Although much smaller than in previous years the Links Market still commands several miles of the town’s promenade for a few weeks in mid-summer.

Kirkcaldy is the birthplace of many noted sons. World-reknowned economist, Adam Smith, is discussed in more detail elsewhere and thus excluded from further discussion here. John Buchan was a noted politician whose loyal foreign service operated alongside his authorship of ‘The Thirty Nine Steps’ and where many believed that the local Ravenscraig Castle, located on a rocky promontory at Kirkcaldy, had inspired the title. In truth though, there are no stairways in the castle with thirty-nine steps. Despite this, Ravenscraig castle is interesting because it was one of the first ever designed in Scotland to resist cannon fire by means of thicker walls and thus better able to resist canon fire from English ships or pirates. King James II began the construction in 1460 and it’s ironic that he died in an accident involving a cannon during the siege on Roxburgh Castle. The initial construction concluded in 1463 but was enhanced circa 1470. Since then the structure served different roles including that of explosive store and perhaps in the belief that this was the safest building in town to contain such material. It became a state care monument in 1955.

Other politicians from Kirkcaldy include David Steele who was the last Liberal Party leader before it unified with the Social Democratic Party to become the Liberal Democratic Party. He was also the first presiding officer of the Scottish Assembly between 1999 and 2003. In modern times, Kirkcaldy’s most famous politician is former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Crime novelists Ian Rankin and Val McDermid, also born in Kirkcaldy, are modern authors who thrill a wide audience of readers with dark tales involving Inspector Rebus and Doctor Tony Hill respectively. Another noted son of modern times is Jack Vettriano whose life seemed set on a career in mining before a gift of watercolours helped uncover a different form of gift and talent. Today, the imaginative originals painted by Vettriano are worth a fortune and where many print copies are popular in many homes.

The list also includes former governors of Australia and more but the name that really stands out from the crowd is Adam Smith. The name ‘Adam Smith’ features prominently in the town. The Adam Smith College, Theatre, Library and Museum are examples. Currently, the Adam Smith College represents unification of colleges from Kirkcaldy and nearby Glenrothes. The Adam Smith Theatre was opened by non other than Andrew Carnegie in 1899. Today, it presents a wide mix of live theatre and films.

In the twentieth century, Kirkcaldy was an industrial town with many workers employed in coal related industries or flour milling, malt and printing. The Nairn linoleum company, originally a supplier of sailcloth for sailing ships, was the dominant employer in the town with a global trade name and reputation.

The Nairn linoleum company became the largest employer in the town but actually began as a sailcloth manufacturer for ships but as the age of marine steam engines virtually ended the age of sail, the company changed direction and where sailcloth preceded woven carpets in many homes.

As this marketplace also changed, Nairn’s became a premier producer of linoleum floors and where a major component is linseed oil made from flax. During the years of production, this gave rise to a curious, but not particularly unpleasant smell, over the town. Word famous comedian, explorer and narrator, Billy Conelly, once described alighting from the train in Kirkcaldy with a burning question, “What’s that f*ck*ng smell?”

Naturally, it drew laughs from local audiences but its kind of sad the smell is now absent because it meant much employment and where products like ’cushion floor’ were internationally famous. In a similar way, the age-old links with textiles led another company called Nelbarden to become an internationally famous swimwear company. The economic confidence at that time suggested the town would have a population of about 70,000 people by 1970 but it never happened. The population peaked at less than 54,000 as a progressive series of closures involving the local coal pits, Nairns, Nelbarden and more took place within a fairly short space of time. Forbo-Nairn is the remaining part of the former linoleum company but is much smaller than the parent company. The Nelbarden site is now a car showroom and vehicle service facility. Both the Francis and Seafield coal mining facility closed with the Seafield area now forming a modern housing estate. The old police headquarters formerly based beside the Francis colliery moved into newer premises in Glenrothes. Other major manufacturers lie GEC and Rank Strand Electric also closed during this period or else in the wake of the Thatcher governmental administration and from which the region, as a whole, has never entirely recovered from. Indeed, since that time, voters in Scotland have rarely chosen to be represented by Conservative MPs. At this time of writing, there is only one Conservative MP is Scotland!

Despite these many knock backs, Kirkcaldy has seen many new service companies try to fill the gap and in terms of demographics, many statistics concerning employment, age etc, remain consistent with other regions of Scotland.

Like many towns in Scotland, Kirkcaldy has had to refocus on different markets and skills. It still retains a fair degree of manufacturing with Swiss owned Forbo-Nairn still making floor coverings and ESA McIntosh making school furniture while Kingdom Bakeries deliver a wide range of high quality foods. Hutchison’s Flour Mill participated in a challenge some years ago in conjunction with a local baker and farmer to produce a loaf of bread in the shortest possible time. Together they broke the World Record! The Adam Smith College is now a combination of colleges with a new building in Glenrothes and already ready to teach new skills to the local population. At this time of writing, the largest employer in Kirkcaldy is MGt, a contract call centre operation and where it’s latest expansion, Iona House in the John Smith business park, was opened by local MP Gordon Brown, then Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Kirkcaldy used to have three hospitals; the Orthopaedic, Forth Park Maternity and the main A&E Victoria Hospital. The former, located beside Ravenscraig Castle, was knocked down many years ago and is now a small housing estate. While Forth Park remains as the main maternity hospital in the region, and perhaps explains why Kirkcaldy has so many famous sons, it is the Victoria Hospital located in the Hayfield area of the town that performs much of the principal medical work in the region and in conjunction with the St Margaret’s hospital in nearby Dunfermline. The severest injuries are typically referred to the Western General in Edinburgh or else Ninewells Hospital in Dundee.At this time of writing in 2011, a new hospital is under construction on an adjacent site and where the site of the older hospital is likely to become a car parking zone.

There are two main public parks in Kirkcaldy: Ravenscraig and Beveridge Parks with this author preferring the latter with its artificially created lake in the centre and where a wide variety of birds, including swans, congregate and where the presence of the latter tends to suggest clean water. Formerly, the park also sported a small ‘animal farm’ with goats and other animals but this has since been removed on account of revised legislation and costs.

Similar comments apply to the aviary that was once popular in the park. In this way, I met with a gentleman who had recently moved to Kirkcaldy and where he expressed a dour opinion that 'Kirkcaldy was another failed seaside town!' and it was easy to see why he might come to such conclusions.

Despite many visits to this park in both summer and winter (and where the lake was frozen) and seeing the narrow gauge railway, I’ve never seen it operate. There’s a podium where bands could play but again, I’ve never seen it in use and in sharp contrast to some other places I’ve visited in the World and where it was traditional and typical for local bands to play on Thursday nights and before visiting workers headed home for the weekend on Friday nights! Just an idea, but it would be interesting if such a tradition was revived or introduced into this part of the World!

The old High Street in Kirkcaldy is pleasant and largely limited to pedestrian traffic these days. In the main, it retains much of the older character and style of yesteryear with many family owned shops but on each side of the main street, there is ‘The Postings’ shopping centre to the north and ‘The Mercat’ to the south. It’s within these centres that national supermarket chains are typically found. In the main street, there are others mixing with more local shops.

Like so many Scottish towns of late, the ancient tradition of the High Street representing the centre of the community has been challenged by the emergence of periphery superstores and supermarkets. Most of ‘big boys’ lie to the north of the town with some concentrated with the ‘Fife Central’ shopping centre or elsewhere along the northern fringe of the town.

Kirkcaldy sports an ice rink, the only remaining one in the region and a rarity in Scotland, with the ‘Fly Fifers’ ice hockey team. The local Rugby team is based at Beveridge Park (described above) while ‘Starks Park’ is home to the ‘Raith Rovers’ football team.

Credits:
Photographs by Kilnburn and Alandon.
Text by Alandon.