Bathgate

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Bathgate
Bathgate shown within Scotland
Population	15,068 (2001 Census)
OS grid reference	NS975695
Council area	West Lothian
Lieutenancy area	West Lothian
Constituent country	Scotland
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	BATHGATE
Postcode district	EH47 & EH48
Dialling code	01506
Police	Lothian and Borders
Fire	Lothian and Borders
Ambulance	Scottish
European Parliament	Scotland
UK Parliament	Linlithgow and East Falkirk
Scottish Parliament	Linlithgow
	Lothians
List of places: UK • Scotland

Coordinates: 55°54′00″N 3°37′00″W / 55.9, -3.633333

Bathgate is a town in West Lothian, Scotland, on the M8 motorway five miles west of Livingston. Neighbouring towns are Blackburn, Armadale, Fauldhouse, Whitburn, Livingston, Stoneyburn, and Linlithgow. Edinburgh Airport is 13 miles (21 km) away. Situated 2 miles (3km) south of the Neolithic burial site at Cairnpapple Hill, Bathgate and the surrounding area show signs of habitation since about 3500 BC.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Medieval Bathgate (circa 1100 – 1500) 1.2 Bathgate 17th – 18th Century 1.3 Bathgate 19th Century 1.4 Bathgate 20th Century 2 Demographics 3 Sport 3.1 Football 4 Culture 4.1 Land art 5 Famous people 6 See also 7 External links 8 Notes 9 References

[edit] History

[edit] Medieval Bathgate (circa 1100 – 1500)

Bathgate first enters the chronicles of historys in a confirmation charter by King Malcolm IV of Scotland (1141 – 9 December 1165). In royal charters of the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries, the name of Bathgate has appeared as: Bathchet (1160), Bathket (1250) and Bathgetum (1316). Batket in the 14th century, and by the 15th appeared as both Bathgat and Bathcat. The name is a “manifest corruption” of the original Cumbric derivation meaning Boar Wood (baedd coed)^[1].

In 1315, The daughter of King Robert I of Scotland (Robert The Bruce), Marjorie (alternatively spelt Margery) Bruce, married Walter Stewart (or Steward) (1293– 1326), the 6th Lord High Steward of Scotland. The dowry to her husband included the lands and castle of Bathgate. Walter died at the castle on the 9 April 1326.

In the 1846 book A Topographical Dictionary of Scotland, Samuel Lewis writes:

“

Of this ancient castle, some slight traces of the foundations only are discernible, in a morass about a quarter of a mile from the town, in which, though it has been drained and brought into cultivation, kitchen utensils of brass, and coffins rudely formed of flat stones, have been discovered by the plough

”

Another antiquarian, W. Jardin, in the Statistical Account of Scotland Vol I (1793), referring to Walter Stewart states:

“

Some traces of his mansion may be seen in the middle of a bog or loch about 1/4 mile from the town. Hewn stones have frequently been dug from the foundations, and some kitchen-utensils of copper or brass have been found.

”

Dating from around the same time the remains of Bathgate's former parish church still stand at Kirkton. The original 12th Century construction was absorbed by a later build in 1739 when a new church was erected on the same site. This simple whitewashed edifice served the community until its last service on the 9 April 1882. King Malcolm IV makes reference to the original church in a charter, granting it to the monks of Holyrood Abbey. Records show that Holyrood Abbey gave the church to the abbot and monks of Newbattle Abbey in 1327.

[edit] Bathgate 17th – 18th Century

In 1606 silver ore was chanced upon at nearby Hilderston, in the shadow of Cairnpapple Hill, by a prospecting collier: Sandy Maund^[2]. This accidental discovery began a short-lived crown “project” in the area. Advisors to King James VI of Scotland became aware how rich in silver the mine may be and in April 1608 repossessed the land for the crown. By December of 1608 it was clear that the ore in the mine was of varying quality and by March 1613 all efforts to extract silver from the area were abandoned.

Bathgate remained a very small rural community until the middle of the 19th century with only a foray by Covenanters in the 17th century to unrest the populace. Frances Groome, in the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4) writes:

“

Some of the inhabitants suffered hardship and loss in the times of the persecution; and the insurgent army of the Covenanters, when on their march from the W to Rullion Green, spent a disastrous night at Bathgate.

”

Robert Louis Stevenson, in the book Lay Morals, Part 2: The Pentland Rising. A Page of History further elucidates upon this night in November 1666:

“

A report that Dalzell was approaching drove them from Lanark to Bathgate, where, on the evening of Monday the 26th, the wearied army stopped. But at twelve o’clock the cry, which served them for a trumpet, of ‘Horse! horse!’ and ‘Mount the prisoner!’ resounded through the night-shrouded town.

”

His depiction goes on to describe how the half the army perished in the freezing weather as they headed towards the Pentland Hills.

[edit] Bathgate 19th Century

Established around 1800, the Glenmavis Distillery in Bathgate was purchased in 1831 by one John McNab, who produced the eponymous MacNab's Celebrated Glenmavis Dew from the site until the distillery's closure in 1910. In 1885, the distillery was producing 80,000 gallons of single malt a year which was transported to Scotland, England and the colonies.^[3]

By the opening of Edinburgh and Bathgate Railway in 1849, local mines and quarries were extracting coal, lime, and ironstone.

James Young’s discovery of cannel coal in the Boghead area of Bathgate, and the subsequent opening of the Bathgate Chemical Works in 1852, the world's first commercial oil-works, manufacturing paraffin oil and paraffin wax, signalled an end to the rural community of previous centuries. When the cannel coal resources dwindled around 1866, Young started distilling paraffin from much more readily available shale^[4]. To this date, the landscape of the Lothians is dotted with the orange spoil heaps (called Bings) from this era. Collieries and quarries and the associated “traditional” industries (brickworks, steelworks)^[5] were the main employers in Bathgate as the 19th century drew to a close.

[edit] Bathgate 20th Century

In the mid-20th century, many local industries were closed and West Lothian was designated a 'Special Development Area'. In such areas, extra financial inducements were offered by the British Government to assist companies wishing to relocate. As a result, in 1961, the BMC — which consisted of the merged Austin Motor Company in Longbridge and Birmingham and Morris Motors in Oxford — located a new Truck & Tractor plant in Bathgate rather than expanding Longbridge as originally planned. The plant closed in 1986, regarded by some as an illustration of the failure of the Special Development Areas policy.

On 24 March 1986^[6], the Bathgate-Edinburgh railway line was re-opened to passengers for the first time since the 1950s. This railway line is to be extended to Airdrie allowing train services to run between Glasgow Queen Street and Edinburgh Waverley via Bathgate railway station by December 2010^[7].

The world's oldest known reptile fossil, Westlothiana lizziae (affectionately referred to as Lizzie), was discovered in East Kirkton Quarry, Bathgate in 1987; it is now in the Museum of Scotland.^[8]

Early in 1992^[9], the US company Motorola opened a mobile phone manufacturing (Personal Communications Sector or PCS) plant at Easter Inch in Bathgate (now the Pyramids Business Park). In 2001, the global market for mobile phones dropped sharply and as a consequence, despite pressure from the highest levels of UK government^[10], on the 24 April 2001 Motorola announced the closure of the plant and the loss of 3,106 jobs^[11]. The 93 acre site is now occupied by Disaster Recovery Services Ltd, HMRC, Morrisons and Quintiles^[12].

Bathgate's war memorial was moved by a BBC television programme from a hill near Kirk Road to a landscaped garden in Mid Street on the 25 July 1995 (Broadcast 10 September 1995).^[13]

Notable Bathgate residents have included David Tennant (born in Bathgate but raised in Paisley), his father Alexander McDonald, former moderator of The Church of Scotland, Sir James Young Simpson, the discoveror of the anesthetic properties of chloroform, and John Newland, one of the town's major benefactors. Newland emigrated to the West Indies. There he became a rich planter, using slaves to maintain and harvest his sugar-cane crop. His benefaction allowed the establishment of Bathgate Academy, which was founded in 1833. He is remembered today by an annual pageant (known as the Procession, Gala Day or Newland's day), held on the first Saturday in June.

The local secondary school is Bathgate Academy. The Bathgate primary schools are Balbardie, St Mary's, Boghall, St Columba's, and Windyknowe. A new primary school, Simpson Primary, opened on the site of the British Leyland Factory in August 2007. It serves the new area of town called Wester Inch. The school is named after James Young Simpson.

[edit] Demographics

Year	1861	1871	1881	1891	1901	1911	1921	1941	1951	1961	1971	1981	1991	2001
Population	4,827	4,991	6,425	5,786	7,549	8,226	8,504	10,127	11,291	not available	not available	not available	13,819	15,068
Sources:Online Historical Population Reports, A Vision Of Britain Through Time and General Register Office for Scotland

Note that the town is experiencing rapid growth, with nearly 3000 new homes built since these statistics were produced, adding 6000 to 8000 more people. WL Business Development website

[edit] Sport

[edit] Football

Bathgate is home to the junior football club Bathgate Thistle.

[edit] Culture

[edit] Land art

Part of the M8 Art Project saw the artist Patricia Leighton's 'sawtooth ramp'project being built in 1993. The sculpture is 1000 feet long and consists of seven 36 foot high ramps. The artist based the design on local geographic features: (drumlins) and the shape of the surrounding bings^[14]. The pyramidic shape of the sculpture gave rise to the name of the nearby Pyramids Business park. In April 2007, a local farmer painted the sheep which graze on the pyramids bright red with a harmless sheep spray^[15].

In 1998 the artist Lumir Soukup built the earth sculpture 'The Bathgate Face' at Wester Inch. By taking facial measurements of more than 1200 Bathgate residents, the artist was able to create an 'average profile' which was the basis for the sculpture. Development in the area in 2004 threatened to demolish the sculpture; however the artist managed to persuade developers to build around his work^[16].

[edit] Famous people

• Racing driver Dario Franchitti was born here. He now races in the USA-based NASCAR series. Won the 2007 Indianapolis 500 and Indy Racing League championship.
• Sir James Young Simpson, discoverer of the anaesthetic properties of chloroform, was born here.
• Actor David Tennant, who played Barty Crouch Jr in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and the Doctor in Doctor Who was born here, although he was raised in Paisley.
• European Tour Golfer, Stephen Gallacher.
• Former Ryder Cup Captain, Bernard Gallacher.
• Former Ryder Cup Captain, Eric Brown.

[edit] See also

• Airdrie-Bathgate Rail Link

[edit] External links

• Undiscovered Scotland, Bathgate
• www.westlothian.com, Bathgate
• www.bathgatehighchurch.org.uk, Bathgate

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• Price, Glanville, Languages in Britain and Ireland (p122), ISBN 978-0631215813
• Lewis, Samuel, A Topographical Dictionary of Scotland (1846), ISBN 978-0806312552
• Groome, Francis Hindes, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland: A Survey of Scottish Topography, Statistical, Biographical and Historical, ISBN 978-1855065727
• Sinclair, Sir John, Statistical Account of Scotland, ISBN 978-0715810019
• Stevenson, Robert Louis, Lay Morals, ISBN 978-1414215877
• Hendrie, William Fyfe and Mackie, Allister, The Bathgate Book, ISBN 978-0954142605
• Hendrie, William Fyfe, Bathgate, ISBN 978-0752421254
• Hendrie, William Fyfe, Bathgate in Old Picture Postcards, ISBN 978-9028831674en:Both Cheit