The year of 1966 saw a return to the pioneering days when the new town of Livingston opened itself to newcomers. Maybe the wildness of the old west was absent, but the challenges were still there to be faced.
Leaving established communities to make a fresh start in an embryo town presented a daunting prospect. However the thought of getting in at the beginning and helping to create it, and growing with it, was equally exciting.
Livingston had been designated a `New Town` under a Central Government Act that was intended to relieve the heavily congested established urban areas of some of their populations. This was commonly know as `overspill`.
Scotland already had three towns so designated, East Kilbride, Cumbernauld, and Glenrothes. Livingston was the latest. Glasgow was the main supplier of a decanted population, and as such, families from there merely had to intimate their desire of moving to receive all the help, monetary included, to qualify and relocate.
Ourselves
We, the Stewarts, a family of four, my wife Olive, our two daughters Karen, aged eight, and Pamela, aged four, and I lived in Leith. Resident there all our lives, we were attracted to the idea of moving to Livingston by an article that appeared in the Edinburgh Evening News early in 1966. However, I had to qualify for consideration by first obtaining a job in the Livingston area. As well as this, we would receive no financial inducement.
I registered for employment in Livingston through the Leith Labour Exchange, as a Job Centre was known then. Within a week I was asked to attend an interview with Brightside Heating Engineers. Here I was offered a contract to work as a plumber in the building of the Cameron Iron Works in the Houston Industrial Estate, Livingston.
I jumped at this opportunity and lost no time in informing the Livingston Development Corporation to register us for a house allocation.
My present job was on a contract hire basis with the Edinburgh chocolate work, William Duncan as a maintenance plumber. The work was simple, and I got on very well with my workmates. As well as this, my two children loved the perks that I brought home. In a way, I was sorry to sever my contacts, but it was necessary if we were to move home.
I was driving my little second hand Austin A30 that I had bought for £130, our first car ever, and hoped it would see me through this commuting period. I reckoned between 40 and 50 miles would have to be covered each day. However, after the first week, a work`s bus became available.
Camerons
I was just getting into my stride with this new job, and the money was better than I had been earning earlier, when the company decided to move me to Perth after four weeks. I knew I could not go with them and informed them to this effect. I had to remain working in Livingston.
Each day for this intial period, I phoned home at lunch time. "Any news?" I would ask Olive. "None!" would be the reply.
I had to seek out another job. Fortunately I found one quite easily. It was with Drake and Scull who were fitting the plumbing work in the new houses of Craigshill.
All the time I was working there, I was aware of the new residents moving in steadily as each phase of the estate was completed. How I envied them. I thought that all the houses would be occupied before we were considered. What made it worse was comparing these new homes and all their mod-cons with the one we occupied back in Leith. `Oh, come on, let there be good news for me when I phone home today,` I thought to myself.
Letter
Lo and behold, the very day I did not phone home I was presented with this letter by my delighted wife and children when I entered the door.
Dated the 20th Ocober 1966, we received it on the 21st. It was the offer of a house. We waved it above our heads as we all danced around the room in sheer exhultation. We could not eat our dinner fast enough for we were all going to visit Livingston later to view the house. A maisonette, it was situated in Leven Walk.
Aberfan
Suddenly we were brought back down to earth. On the TV came the new of a disaster in Aberfan, South Wales. The very day of our good news one hundred and forty people (120 of them children) had perished when a mud slip from an old coal bing had enveloped a schoolhouse.
We were shocked and saddened, as was the whole country. How could we be happy for ourselves when so many young people had died in such tragic circumstances?
Saddened as we were, there was nothing we could do about it personally. Still murmuring about it, we set off after 7.00pm to head for Livingston.
Olive in `Blue Peter` 1966 Don`t be fooled, she never did drive
Leven Walk
The four of us had piled into the A30 and drove through the Calders until we crossed the old Howden Bridge. Then up into Craigshill on a road that for some unseeing reason curved through 180 degrees into the estate. Later we found this was actually an underpass for the main Almond Bridge that was yet to be built.
Being a late autumnal evening, it was dark when we arrived in Leven Walk. No street lights were yet functioning. Only house lights escaping from the occupied Broom and Rannoch Walks relieved the darkness.
With the help of a feeble beam from a hand held torch, we eventually found 12 Leven Walk. Actually, it was one of six houses in the common stair. Much to our dismay, but hardly surprising, the stair door was locked. No tenants were in occupancy yet.
We had to be content with an outside view of our future home. I pointed it out and said it would not be long before we were actually living there. Like them, I was impatient to get the keys of our maisonette. Olive had originally expressed disappointment at not getting a garden but I assured her she would be pleased with what we were getting once she saw the inside of the house.
