From the Northern Times 25, 50 and 100 years ago
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25 YEARS AGO
From the newspaper of June 5, 1998
A £285,000 upgrading project designed to improve facilities at Golspie's Seaforth House has been branded a disaster by local community councillor Munro Macleod. The residential home for the elderly has been spoilt by the costly scheme aimed at converting it into a community care unit, Mr Macleod told a meeting of Golspie Community Council this week. Complaints ranged from sinks and baths in the en suite bedrooms so small that residents found difficulty using them, to the money spent on providing conservatories for each of the three wings.
The Ben Loyal Hotel in Tongue has been put on the market, with an asking price of over £250,000. Owners Mel and Pauline Cook, who are retiring, are selling the well-known 12-bedroomed hotel.
Golspie woman Elaine Hunter, Station Road, is one of a number of Highland parents who are refusing to pay controversial charges for music tuition recently introduced in schools.
50 YEARS AGO
From the newspaper of June 1, 1973
A HOTEL cook, at her own expense, entertained to lunch, last Friday, the five members of the Scourie telephone exchange who had just lost their jobs with the introduction of a new £800,000 automatic exchange and switching centre. The cook was Johan Munro, a telephone subscriber. She said: "I feel very badly that nothing was done to thank them officially. The only thing I could do was entertain them to lunch."
Concern is mounting in Scourie over delays in completing renovations to Scourie Primary School. It had been planned to have the work finished by last April, but now it is not certain when the school will be ready. Protests have been made through representations from Edrachillis and Durness sub-education committee to Sutherland Education Authority.
Raymond Macpherson, who used to run a sheep farm in north Sutherland, is in the United States at the moment competing for the world championship in sheepdog trials on a farm called Buck and Doe Run.
100 YEARS AGO
From the newspaper of May 31, 1923
Mr James Balantine, Edinburgh, has completed the war memorial stained glass window for Dornoch Cathedral which is to be dedicated next month in the cathedral. The design shows the figure of a mediaeval knight in armour in an attitude expressive of rest and peace.
The legless Australian, who is said to be going from Land's End to John O'Groats for a wager of £1000, passed through Golspie on Friday afternoon and attracted much attention. It was a pitiful sight to see him wobble along on his hands, supported by the trunk of his body. His affliction was apparently caused by a railway accident early in life.
The Mound station is at present receiving a seasonable coat of paint but the work will be completed long before the visitor season is in full swing.
A REQUEST from parents for a school at Slettle instead of Strahan was rejected by Sutherland Education Authority.
