The photographs in this week’s trip down West Fife’s Memory Lane feature one of Dunfermline’s best remembered shops, Scott the Butchers, well known to most West Fifers with their range of steak pies, haggis and black puddings that won many industry awards.
Our first photograph shows their premises at 25 High Street.
Founder John Scott was brought up in Kirkcaldy, but it was in Dunfermline in 1911 that he opened his butcher’s shop.
The premises traded as a grocers prior to this and is now the site of Bryan Beveridge Butchers.
It is believed that John Scott supplied the Fleet at Rosyth during the First World War and that provided a sound foundation for a business that was in the family for 89 years.
There are several old postcards featuring the horse drawn butcher's carts that ‘hawked’ an area from North Queensferry to Saline, and our next photograph shows one of them in action.
A stable serviced the seven carts and eight horses at 30 James Street. In time the horse drawn carts were replaced by motor vehicles with both a travelling shop and delivery vans covering the same area.
John Scott’s son, also called John, entered the business after World War Two and his son Douglas in 1972 made it the third generation.
Gillian Daly remembers shopping there: “I always remember this butchers with sawdust on the floor and the cash register in the glass box.
"I had a memory of it being higher up with steps to it but maybe that’s because I was little!”
Mark Sparrow also recalls the shop: “Rabbit and pheasants hanging outside the shop and sawdust on the floor inside.”
The business expanded into premises above where sausages, haggis, puddings and pastry goods were manufactured.
The next photograph is of the interior of the shop with manager Raymond Cunningham seen on the left slicing bacon, who was later succeeded as manager by Jimmy Henry who is pictured on the right.
Christine Evans recalls the period when Jimmy was manager: “I remember Jimmy and his wife Pearl well.
"My late mum, Eileen Tyson, worked for Scotts for many years. She worked upstairs with John Gourlay from Kelty making sausages, haggis etc."
Note from the photograph that the counter wasn’t yet refrigerated at that time, with meat just hanging in the windows on open display, as remembered by Bob Howie: “In those days the shop wasn't heated so the meat stayed fresh.
"I remember walking into the butchers and always feeling chilly. I lived in England during the last years it was open but every time I came up to visit I went back with a car full of ribs.”
Our final photograph is of some of the staff in the shop.
From left to right they are David Simpson, Douglas Scott, Jacqueline Bird, George Henderson and Bill Taylor.
More photographs like these can be seen in Dunfermline Carnegie Library and Galleries as well as at facebook.com/olddunfermline.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here