Kitchen cookers have developed dramatically in the last few decades. Microwave ovens have had wide public usage since the 1980s and now highly technical combination ovens using gas, electric and microwaves are sometimes available in the same appliance to enable perfection cooking.
This week’s subject is one of their predecessors. It is a Smith & Wellstood Sovereign Range, popular in the period 1890 – 1930. The big black Scottish ranges which dominated the kitchens of our predecessors were also multi-functional. As well as being a stove with an oven for baking, many like the Sovereign were also heaters and water heaters (note the tap for drawing water on the right), had hot plates and apertures which could serve as toasters and, when a line was strung from side to side of the mantlepiece could also dry clothes. All of them were coal-fired and some grandparents today can remember the Friday night ritual of black-leading the range to give it a perfect shine at the end of the week.
Smith & Wellstood originated in an ironmongery business in Glasgow in 1835 and their expansion to Bonnybridge and overseas is also the story of the Industrial Revolution. This is a model in the Stirling Smith collections used by a travelling salesman to explain the workings of the stove to customers.
Photograph by Alan Gardiner
Although there are 215 days to Christmas, the purpose of today’s story is to flag up some very special bags of help which have been given to the Stirling Smith. This little paper bag for cards was a very small part of the great Stirling enterprise of Graham and Morton. The company began in Stirling in 1830 in Baker Street, moved to King Street a few years later and was still there when the business closed in about 1988. It began in ironmongery and then expanded into furniture, house furnishings of all kinds, table and silver ware, tents and marquees, house removals and motor car sales. They operated a large cabinet and upholstery works on Burghmuir and had a warehouse in Falkirk, in an era when furniture manufacturing was local.
The Smith has a collection of bags for many Stirling shops which are no longer with us: McLachlan & Brown, McAree Brothers and Jean Hamilton Ladies Fashion of Port Street.
The Smith is not mounting an exhibition of bags but would like to express thanks for the recent Bags of Help from Tesco in Stirling and Bridge of Allan. This has enabled the painting of the glass roof in Gallery 3 to exclude the daylight which was damaging the collections.
The matter of the water supply does not trouble us much. We turn on the taps and enjoy clean drinking and bathing water without fuss or effort.
Until the 1840s, the fetching and carrying of water was a major task in Stirling. Circuit Judge Lord Cockburn deplored the fact that ‘the public wells have only one spout each…poor people are obliged to stand shivering for hours before they can get their vessels filled. …I counted 200 tubs, pails, pitchers etc ….with their owners waiting their turns from the solitary spouts. I told the Provost that if I was in his place, these evils should be remedied in a month, simply multiplying the spouts at the existing drawing places.’ The public wells were also contaminated and a proven source of illness.
As ratepayers objected to a compulsory water rate, it took an Act of Parliament in 1848 and the creation of the Stirling Waterworks Commission to resolve the issue. The photograph (taken by Stirling’s premier photographers, Crowe & Rogers) shows the new filter beds in the Touch Hills, under construction, November 1895. The engineers were McLuckie and Walker, and Alexander Gall was the main contractor.
The photograph is a recent gift to the Smith by Mrs Wilson of Alva.
People visit the Stirling Smith for many reasons. Recently the Goss Ware Collector’s Club which draws its membership Britain-wide came specially to see the original Stirling Jug. They brought these three jugs as a gift to the Stirling Smith collections. Printed on the base is ‘Model of the Stirling Pint Measure. One of the ancient standard measures of Scotland deposited in Stirling by Act of Parliament 1457’.
Stirling was given the Jug as it was the main brewing area of Scotland. Measures in all other towns had to be calibrated against it. Made of gun metal, it contains about three and a half Imperial pints. Pride in the Jug continued to the early 20th century, when the Jug was carried in civic processions.
The design of this piece of Goss ware was registered in 1910. The company embellished these souvenirs with coats of arms from different towns. Glasgow, Edinburgh and Stirling are on the pieces here. Another in the Smith collections has Cambridge and there are examples with many other English towns, so the Stirling Jug is known to Goss collectors world-wide.
In 1888 and 1901 the original Stirling Jug was loaned to the Glasgow International Exhibitions. It is one of the unique objects in the Smith collections and every young visitor learns about it.
photo taken by Stirling Smith collections volunteer Alan Gardiner
The 
Historic Environment Scotland exhibition of aerial photographs of Stirling and Central Scotland before 1954 continues at the Stirling Smith..
Aerial photographs have a perennial fascination for people as they reveal so much. This view of Kings Park, from the top of Victoria Place looking north to the Old Town Jail, Cowane’s Hospital and the Church of the Holy Rude at the top of the town, was taken in about 1978. It shows a cityscape which to all appearances has not changed much in 30 years. The Kings Park area was previously the royal hunting park. Later, it was divided into different fields or crofts from which the burgh derived income rentals. Sand quarrying also took place at various points. With the coming of the railways in 1848, the opportunity was taken to feu out the area for the building of villas whose owners might work in Glasgow or Edinburgh, thanks to the new transport. In the 1970s, Kings Park became a conservation area, prohibiting modern intrusions.
At this time, there was no roundabout at the junction of Queen’s Road and Albert Place, no car park in the grounds of the Stirling Smith and the big trees which now shroud the building had just been planted.
The photograph was donated by Jamie Burgoyne who found it in a charity shop.
Many people wonder about the value of museum collections and the cost of keeping items from the past. This latest Stirling Smith acquisition, a magazine of 1960, tells us so much about the social history of the town. The art work on the cover dates to 1948 and was done by James Atterson (1898 – 1961), head of Art at the High School of Stirling whose style was so distinctive that it is immediately recognisable. Atterson was a public-spirited man who would design Stirling-themed images for organisations in the town and build and paint sets for theatrical productions. Between this and teaching, there was no time left over for his own art and only small works seem to survive.
The Magazine records improvements in nursing and the names and addresses of the 300 members of the Stirling Royal Infirmary Nurse’s League, with their year of qualification, the earliest being 1904. The annual ball was in the Golden Lion Hotel. Among the medical improvements noted was the new Central Syringe Sterilising Unit, prior to which every ward boiled their own syringes, and the new Occupational Therapy Centre at Orchard House.
In terms of history the magazine is priceless, though the cost was £2.99. It was secured by Friend of the Smith Frances Chatfield in the Oxfam Bookshop.
Following the succe
ss of the digitisation of the paintings in public collections, Art UK has now turned to sculpture, including the 40 pieces owned by the Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum. This maquette of the oldest William Wallace sculpture is by Alloa sculptor Walter Awlson. It was commissioned from him in 1997, for the exhibition Scotland’s Liberator, marking the 700th anniversary of the Battle of Stirling Bridge. It was a difficult matter to get the proportions correct. The piece was modelled in red earthenware and fired, to match the original which was carved from Dumfriesshire red sandstone.
The maquette is one metre high. The original statue, overlooking the River Tweed at Bemersyde near Melrose is a massive 30 feet high and was made by architect, builder and sculptor John Smith, who with his brothers, was also commissioned to build Sir Walter Scott’s house at Abbotsford. The sculpture was commissioned by David Steuart Erskine, the Eleventh Earl of Buchan (1742-1829), a scholar, antiquarian and patriot who founded the Scottish Museum of Antiquities. The dress and features of the work are based on a now-lost mediaeval portrait found by Buchan in France.
Most subsequent Wallace portraits are modelled on this one and although Sir Walter Scott secretly wanted to see the statue demolished, it still stands as the oldest and biggest.
‘
Textile Alchemy’ is the title of the latest exhibition by the Turning Point Textile group at the Stirling Smith. Turning Point is a group of seven textile artists from the central belt of Scotland who work separately but hang well together.
There are six themes in the exhibition, and Joyce Watson’s ‘Puddles to Power’ piece with the pylon, is in the environment section. ‘Water fills the dams, feeding our hydro-electric power which is then transmitted by majestic pylons’. After the protests over the Beauly to Denny Power line with its 615 giant pylons, pylon majesty is not the kind of theme that might have been expected in a gallery setting. The alchemy of the exhibition is in how textile materials are transformed into beautiful works of art.
One hanging by Christine Livingstone, depicting the artist’s garden with flowers was made with materials from a charity shop. ‘Trees and Leaves’ by Margaret Morrow has leaf shapes stitched to a layer of sheer fabric and the background burned using a soldering iron. The effect is that of an autumn day with leaves floating in the breeze.
At present, textile art is neither highly prized or priced, but these are the heirlooms of the future and most are available to buy now.
Due to the retiral of the current job holder, we are seeking a Museum Director for The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum.
The Stirling Smith has played a special role in the history of Stirling since its foundation in 1874. The Institution was founded at the bequest of local artist Thomas Stuart Smith (1815-1869) and its remarkable collections tell the story of Stirling, which was so often pivotal to Scotland, and how its sons and daughters have made global contributions to society, the arts and technology.
It’s a unique cultural institution hosting artefacts and paintings of Stirling of local, national and international importance (e.g. the world’s oldest football (1540), the world’s oldest curling stone (1511) and the Stirling Jug (1457)) and all from a building of architectural significance. The organisation also provides invaluable educational programmes to the local community, plays host to a wide range of community groups, and benefits from incredible public support from the ‘Friends of the Smith’, Stirling Council and other community partners.
The Museum Director would be remitted with taking forward this culturally significant organisation through the implementation of The Stirling Smith vision. It’s a hidden gem with ambitious plans for the future, including further raising its profile across Scotland and beyond, strengthening its sustainability, further diversifying its service offering and developing the building.
The ideal candidate will have Museum or Art Gallery management experience and a well-developed understanding of the cultural scene across Scotland. You will be an inspirational and dynamic leader and communicator with a strong track record of delivery of projects, exhibitions and events on time and on budget to a high quality. You will also be a highly effective networker and manager of people and relationships who is comfortable with communities, public and political leaders and private sector and creative or cultural sector partners. The successful candidate will be commercially aware and committed to continuing the legacy of this unique cultural institution.
Please send your CV to our recruitment partners McAdam King at smiths@mcadamking.com or call them on 0141 333-4750 to discuss this rare and exciting opportunity.
The news of beavers returning to the River Forth, as reported in the Stirling Observer, is timely. This beaver shop sign is at present in the exhibition on shop fronts in the Engine Shed. In the eighteenth century, the word “beaver” and “hat” were virtually synonymous. Beavers were hunted to extinction in Scotland in the 1600s, and beaver skins were imported from Scandinavia and later from the American colonies to supply the hatters’ trade.
The beaver possibly had her first mention in the Stirling Observer in a front-page advertisement of 8 November 1849 for Owen’s London Hat Warehouse ‘at the sign of the gilded beaver, foot of King Street, Stirling’. This was at 3 King Street, occupied by several other hatters in the decades which followed.
Stirling had four hatters’ premises in the nineteenth century. The trade was not a healthy one. Use of arsenic and other chemicals in dressing the fur resulted in damage to the central nervous system, which often displayed itself in the form of tics and involuntary muscle movements. This gave rise to the common saying “As mad as a Hatter”.
The shop sign was rescued from a bonfire by property owner Peter Wordie in 1970, and in 2009, he gifted it to the Stirling Smith. It was restored by funding provided by the Friends of the Smith.