Features - Notable Dates in History

4 June 1832	The Scottish Reform Bill, increasing the number of Scottish MPs from 45 to 53, and thus widening the vote, was passed at Westminster.
16 July 1832	Thirty-one Shetland "sixerns", with a total of 105 crewmen were lost in a storm. The event is still remembered as "The Bad Day".
17 July 1832	Scottish Reform Bill became law.
11 August 1832	About 50,000 people gathered at the Links, in Edinburgh, to celebrate the passing of the Scottish Reform Bill.
21 September 1832	Death of Sir Walter Scott, novelist and poet, at his Abbotsford home. “Scott is dead. He expired yesterday. I had been on a visit to Kirklands, and on coming home today I saw Abbotsford reposing beside its gentle Tweed, and amidst its fading woods, in the calm splendour of a sweet autumnal day. I was not aware till I reached Edinburgh that all that it then contained of him was his memory and his remains. Scotland never owed so much to one man.” Lord Cockburn ‘Journal’
30 October 1833	Reporters were allowed to attend meetings of Edinburgh town council for the first time.
2 January 1834	A Perthshire woman from Bankfoot, known as Widow Graham, died aged 100. She recalled having seen Prince Charles Edward Stewart at Blair Atholl where her father had joined the Jacobite army.
26 March 1834	Death of Jean Armour, 'relict of the poet Burns', at Dumfries. She had been the widow of Robert Burns for thirty-eight years. Of a’ the airts the wind can blaw, I dearly like the west, For there the bonie lassie lives, The lassie I lo’e best: Though wild-woods grow, and rivers row, And mony a hill between: Baith day and night my fancys’ flight Is ever wi’ my Jean Written by her husband on their honeymoon.
2 September 1834	Death of Thomas Telford, civil engineer, who constructed roads, bridges and canals in Scotland, Wales, England and Sweden and was the first President of the Institute of Civil Engineers.
2 October 1834	Sir Patrick Geddes, biologist, town planner and sociologist, was born at Ballater, Aberdeenshire. Acknowledged as the ‘Father of Town Planning’, his exhortation ‘think global, act local’ has influenced succeeding generations.
25 November 1835	Birth of Andrew Carnegie at Dunfermline. His family emigrated to the USA and he became a leading iron and steel manufacturer, millionaire and philanthropist.
21 December 1835	Death of Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, MP, President of the Board of Agriculture, organiser of the first Statistical Account of Scotland.
1 July 1836	North of Scotland Bank founded by Alexander Anderson and others in Aberdeen.
16 July 1836	Brig Mariner left Loch Eriboll in Sutherland for Cape Breton and Quebec with 154 emigrants, mostly from the Reay district.
30 July 1836	Ninety-two people were enrolled as depositors on the opening day of the Savings Bank of Glasgow.
26 November 1836	Death of John MacAdam, road-making engineer and inventor of the road surface bearing his name, at Moffat.
8 July 1837	Birth of Donald Dinnie, outstanding athlete who competed world-wide, at Balnacraig, near Aboyne, Aberdeenshire. An tremendous competitor at Scottish Highland Games he won more than 11,000 contests: these included 2,000 prizes for throwing the hammer, 1,800 prizes for putting the stone, more than 2,000 for wrestling, 300 prizes for throwing weights, 1,400 prizes for tossing the caber, 1.800 prizes for jumping, and about 500 for running.
27 September 1837	Glasgow’s first railway, from Townhead to Garnick, was opened to passenger traffic.
2 March 1838	The Clydesdale Bank was formed. “The Clydesdale Banking Company. Capital, One Million. Under the above designation, it is proposed to establish a New Joint-Stock Banking Company in the city of Glasgow, on principles which will enable the Capitalist, Merchant, Manufacturer, and Tradesman to participate in the benefits of banking operations.” From the original prospectus
21 April 1838	John Muir, the Scottish conservationist and naturalist considered the father of the environmental movement, was born in Dunbar. His family emigrated to Wisconsin, USA, in 1849 and his work in the Yosemite Valley in California led to the establishment of the United States' National Park system.
22 April 1838	The 703-ton Sirius, built by R Menzies & Sons, Leith, and carrying 90 passengers, reached Sandy Hook, New York, to become the first to cross the Atlantic entirely under steam. Shortage of fuel forced the crew to burn spars and wood furniture to complete the 18-day voyage.
12 July 1838	Death in Edinburgh of Rev. John Jamieson, D.D., minister of the Secession Church and compiler of 'The Dictionary of the Scottish Language'.
11 April 1839	Death of John Galt, poet, dramatist, biographer, traveller, secretary of the Canada Company and founder of Guelph, Ontario, novelist and author of The Annuls of the Parish, The Ayrshire Legatees, Sir Andrew Wylie, The Provost, The Entail, etc., at Greenock.
30 December 1839	Death of Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland, Rankeillor-born distinquished naval officer, on board his flag-ship, The Wellesley, at sea in the vicinity of Bombay. He accepted French Emperor Napoleon’s surrender in 1815 following the battle of Waterloo.
5 February 1840	Birth of John Boyd Dunlop, veterinary and pioneer of the pneumatic tyre, at Dreghorn, North Ayrshire.
8 December 1840	Blantyre-born missionary and explorer David Livingstone sailed for Africa. He landed at Cape Town to begin a lifetime's work in the Dark Continent.
6 May 1841	Death of John Thomson, composer and inaugural Reid Professor of Music at Edinburgh University (1838), his compositions were much admired by Mendelssohn.
28 May 1841	Seven ministers of the Presbytery of Strathbogie were deposed by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland for obeying the civil rather than the ecclesiastical law.
1 June 1841	Death of Sir David Wilkie, one of Scotland’s greatest-ever artists, King’s Limner, at sea off Gibralter. His burial at sea was painted by Turner.
13 January 1842	Scotsman Dr William Brydon, the sole survivor of a 16,000 strong British force that had left Kubul a week earlier and had been massacred in the mountain passes by Afghan tribesmen, reached the hill fort of Jalalabad.
23 May 1842	General Assembly of the Church of Scotland condemned patronage as a grievance to the cause of true religion that ought to be abolished.
10 August 1842	The Mines Act was passed at Westminster forbidding women and children to work underground.
20 September 1842	Birth of Sir James Dewar in Kincardine-on-Forth, physician and chemist; inventor of the vacuum flask.
17 May 1843	The Disruption, when after prolonged disputes over the Established Church of Scotland's liability to the operation of statute law and judgements of the courts, 474 ministers (out of about 1200) signed the Deed of Demission and formed the Free Church of Scotland. 'We protest that, in the circumstances in which we are placed, it is and shall be lawful for us and such other Commissioners as may concur with us, to withdraw to a separate place of meeting for the purpose of taking steps, along with all who will adhere to us, maintaining with us the Confession of Faith and Standards of the Church of Scotland as heretofore understood, for separating in an orderly way from the Establishment...' [From the formal protest made by the Moderator to the General Assembly]
1 July 1843	The Union Bank of Scotland, being an amalgamation over the years of the Ship Bank of Colin Dunlop and Houston, Coutts and Co., Forbes, Hunter and Co., Thistle Bank, Glasgow Union Bank, opened in Glasgow.
5 August 1843	Birth of James Scott Skinner in Banchory, known as 'The Strathspey King' he was a renowned fiddler and composer of some 600 tunes. Scott Skinner emerged as the first international Scottish 'star'.
17 November 1843	Birth of Dr William Wallace, editor of the Glasgow Herald (1906-19909), at Culross, Fife.
1 February 1844	The lamp at Skerryvore Lighthouse off the west coast of Scotland went into operation. It was engineered by Alan Stevenson (uncle of Robert Louis Stevenson) for the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses. It stands 48 metres high and has a range of 23 miles.
6 March 1844	George Meikle Kemp, self-taught architect and designer of the Scott Monument, Edinburgh, drowned in the Union Canal. He missed his footing in the darkness and fell into the canal whilst walking along the bank to meet boats bringing stones for the monument.
13 July 1845	First cargo of imported American ice unloaded at the Broomielaw from the brigantine Acton of New York.
26 October 1845	Death of Lady Caroline Nairne, songwriter and poet, at Gask, Perthshire. Her work is still popular and includes such favourites as 'The Laird o Cockpen', 'Caller Herrin', 'Charlie is my darling', 'Will ye no come back again' and 'The Land o the Leal'.
10 December 1845	Pneumatic tyres patented by Scottish civil engineer Robert Thomson. Manufacture proved to be too expensive until developed by John Boyd Dunlop in 1888.
12 February 1846	Death of Rev Henry Duncan, minister of Ruthwell, founder of Dumfries and Galloway Courier, restorer of the Ruthwell Cross (erected about 730), and promoter of the first savings bank in 1810.
18 June 1846	North British Railway was opened from Edinburgh to Berwick-on-Tweed. The inaugural train had five locomotives and according to a newspaper report - 'The enormous size of the train must be considered, consisting of 26 or 28 carriages, and with the five locomotives and tenders, extending to nearly a furlong, or something more than one division of Princes Street. To bystanders the sight must have been extremely imposing, especially at the curvature, where the monster train was seen to bend to the right and left, and display the flexibility of a silken cord, while rivalling the eagle's flight in speed." From 'The Scostman' account
3 March 1847	Birth of Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, in Edinburgh. His family emigrated to Canada in 1870 and moved to the USA in 1871.
17 April 1847	The Educational Institute of Scotland was founded 'to promote sound learning and advance the interests of education in Scotland'.
31 May 1847	Death of Thomas Chalmers, mathematician, preacher, moral philosopher, economist and social reformer, theologian, leader of the Disruption of 1843 in the Church of Scotland and first Moderator of the Free Church of Scotland, in Edinburgh.
9 November 1847	In Edinburgh, Dr James Young Simpson delivered Wilhelmina Carstairs while chloroform was administered to the mother, the first child to be born with the aid of anaesthesia.
29 February 1848	Death of Inverurie weaver poet William Thom (1798-1848). Best known for his poem 'The Mitherless Bairn'.
7 March 1848	Chartists riots in Glasgow.
23 March 1848	Free Church of Scotland settlement at New Edinburgh, later Dunedin, New Zealand, under Rev Thomas Burns, a nephew of the poet Robert Burns.
2 December 1848	Mary Slessor, the Dundee mill-girl turned missionary, was born in Aberdeen. She trained as a missionary for the United Presbyterian Church and worked against savage folk-rites, and to improve conditions for negro women in Calabar, Nigeria where she died in 1915. ‘By her enthusiasm, self-sacrifice and greatness of character she earned the devotion of thousands of the natives among whom she worked, and the love and esteem of all Europeans irrespective of class or creed, with whom she came in contact.’ From an obituary in the Government Gazette
16 October 1849	The execution of the Auchterless murderer James Robb was the first to be carried out by the London hangman William Calcraft in Aberdeen. Robb was apprehended by the renowned Aberdeen sheriff and criminal officer George Webster for the murder of sixty-two-year-old spinster Mary Smith.
26 January 1850	Death of Francis, Lord Jeffrey, a founder and editor of the Edinburgh Review. "I could not live anywhere out of Scotland. All my recollections are Scottish and consequently all my imaginations; and though I thank God that I have as few fixed opinions as any man of my standing, yet all the elements out of which they are made have a certain national cast also." letter to Lord Murray, 20 August 1813
7 February 1850	World's first train-ferry, 417-ton Leviathan, began work on the Granton-Burntisland run for Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee Railway.
10 May 1850	Birth of Sir Thomas Lipton, founder of Lipton’s grocery chain and philanthropist, who went from message boy to millionaire by the age of 30, in Glasgow.
17 October 1850	James Young obtains a patent for the extraction of paraffin from shale, the beginning of the paraffin industry in West Lothian. The successful business earned the Glasgow-born Chemist the nickname 'Paraffin Young'.
13 November 1850	Birth off Robert Louis Stevenson, author and poet, in Edinburgh, only son of lighthouse engineer Thomas Stevenson. Famous for books such as "Kidnapped" and "Treasure Island", ill-health forced him to leave Scotland and he died at Vailima, Samoa on 3 December 1894. "I have been a Scotchman all my life and denied my native land."
15 March 1851	Nitshill mining disaster in which 61 miners from the Victoria pit lost their lives.
28 February 1852	The committee of the Highland Society of Scotland saw a demonstration of a steam-plough in a field near Portobello.
24 May 1852	Birth of Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham, scholar, author and politician. He was the first President of both the Scottish Labour Party (1888) and Scottish National Party (1934).
11 October 1852	Queen Victoria and Prince Albert watched the completion of a cairn at Balmoral to commemorate their purchase of the estate.
9 February 1853	Owing to ill-health Alan Stevenson resigned as Chief Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse Board. He had succeeded his father, Robert Stevenson, to the post in 1844 and was responsible for the design and construction of ten new lights including Skerryvore in Argyll. He was, in turn, succeeded by his brother David Stevenson.
26 May 1853	Death of James Chalmers, bookseller, printer, newspaper publisher and deviser of the adhesive postage stamp.
8 September 1853	The Deeside rail line was opened from Aberdeen to Banchory – it was extended to Ballater in 1860, a total distance of 43 ¼ miles. The line was closed in 1966.
29 September 1853	The Annie Jane, an emigrant ship bound for Quebec, sank off the Hebrides with a loss of 348 lives.
2 November 1853	First public meeting of the National Association for the Vindication of Scottish Rights was held in Edinburgh.
31 July 1854	The lighthouse ship sailed from Leith with a cargo of men and a hundred tons of material to commence work on the Muckle Flugga Lighthouse. The lighthouse was completed towards the end of 1857.
19 September 1854	The Great North of Scotland Railway opened, form Aberdeen to Huntly.
20 September 1854	Paisley-born (1826) Sergeant James McKechnie, a Scots Fusilier Guard, became one of the first men to be awarded the Victoria Cross for his bravery at the Battle of Alma. In spite of being wounded in action he rallied his battalion after they had been thrown into disorder by withering enemy fire.
27 October 1854	Birth of Sir William Alexander Smith, founder of the Boys’ Brigade and businessman, at Pennyland House, near Thurso, Caithness. He was knighted in July 1909 in London.
16 February 1855	The emigration ship Tornado sailed from Glasgow’s Broomielaw with 5oo settlers bound for Melbourne, Australia.
6 September 1855	Sergeant J Croy of the Scots Fusilier Guards was awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery at the storming of the Redan during the Crimean War; it was one of the first Victoria Crosses awarded.
4 January 1856	Faculty of Actuaries in Scotland was constituted.
21 October 1857	John Booth was the last person to be publicly executed in Aberdeen, for the murder of his mother-in-law Jean Barclay in Oldmeldrum. The hanging was carried out by London hangman William Calcraft.
8 March 1859	Birth of Kenneth Grahame, author of ‘The Wind in the Willows’, in Edinburgh.
2 May 1859	Death of Stow-born Rev Dr John Lee, principal of the University of Edinburgh (1840-1859), in Edinburgh. He opposed the 1843 Disruption and in 1844 was elected Moderator of the Church of Scotland.
22 May 1859	Birth of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, novelist and creator of Sherlock Holmes, in Edinburgh.
16 September 1859	Blantyre-born missionary and African explorer Dr David Livingstone discovered Lake Nyasa. In so doing, he inadvertently opened the area to slave procurement.
15 October 1859	The Loch Katrine Water supply scheme was opened by Queen Victoria. The supply of water from Loch Katrine in the Trossachs to Glasgow - a distance of some 35 miles - became available to the city in March 1860.
26 September 1860	First Open Golf Championship was held at Prestwick. The Belt was won by Willie Park of Musselburgh. There were seven other entrants.
26 January 1861	Edinburgh’s famous one o’ clock gun was fired for the first time from the Castle.
23 October 1861	Prince Albert laid foundation stone of the Industrial Museum in Chambers Street, Edinburgh, later to become the Royal Museum of Scotland.
28 September 1864	Birth of Charles Murray, ‘Hamewith’, engineer and poet, at Alford, Aberdeenshire. He emigrated to South Africa in 1888 and began writing poetry, mostly in the East coast dialect of Scots, which was noted for its perceptive and evocative portrayal of Aberdeenshire life at the turn of the century. This was reflected in his best known poem ‘The Whistle’. He returned to Scotland in 1924 and settled in Banchory, Kincardineshire, where he died in 1941.
6 November 1864	Death of Daniel Stow, founder of the Glasgow Normal College for the teaching of teachers, pioneer of co-education, opponent of prize-giving and corporal punishment.
1 February 1865	The Highland Railway formed by the amalgamation of the Inverness and Perth Junction and the Inverness and Aberdeen Junction Railways.
5 July 1865	The Locomotive and Highway Act stipulated that the speed limit for road vehicles in Britain should be 4 mph in the country and 2 mph in towns.
25 July 1865	Dr ‘James’ Miranda Stuart Barry died aged 70 in London. At a time when a career in medicine was forbidden to women, Dr Barry worked her way through to the highest rank in the British Army Medical Service masquerading as a man, successfully concealing her gender from everyone until her death – ‘the most skilful of physicians and the most wayward of men’. As a male she graduated MD from Edinburgh University in 1812 and joined the army as a surgeon’s mate the following year and retired in 1864 as Inspector-General of Military Hospitals in Montreal and Quebec.
28 July 1865	The last public hanging in Glasgow was watched by a crowd of 30,000. An Englishman, Dr Edward Pritchard, was executed for poisoning his wife and mother-in-law.
9 July 1867	Queens Park Football Club, the first senior club in Scotland, was formed. The Club dominated the early days of Scottish Football but, retaining as it still does amateur status, lost out to professional sides. Season 1999/2000 saw 'The Spiders' gain promotion as Division 3 Champions.
6 November 1867	The first Scottish Woman's Suffrage Society met in Edinburgh. The first President was Pricilla McLaren, wife of the radical Edinburgh MP Duncan McLaren, who championed Scottish rights at Westminster and was known as 'The Member for Scotland', and sister of anti-Corn Law campaigner Jacob Bright.
22 March 1868	Birth of Hamish MacCunn, outstanding composer and son of a shipowner, at Greenock. He became the youngest pupil and one of the first at the newly founded College of Music in London, and composed his best-known work, the concert overture, ‘Land of the Mountain and the Flood’, at 17.
12 May 1868	Scotland’s last public execution took place in Dumfries when Robert Smith, 19, was hanged for the rape and murder of a nine-year-old girl. By the end of the month a bill to abolish public hangings had received royal assent.
5 June 1868	Birth of James Connolly, trade union leader, socialist and Irish Nationalist, in Edinburgh. Based in Dublin he formed the Irish Citizens Army and was one of the leaders of the 1916 Irish Easter Rising. He was one of the fourteen executed following the failure of the Rising.
6 September 1868	The Scottish Cooperative Wholesale Society commenced business in Glasgow.
22 April 1869	Death of Rev. Patrick Bell of Carmyllie in Angus, inventor ( in 1828 ) of the reaping machine.
12 November 1869	Edinburgh University became the first in Britain to admit women to study medicine. Sophia Jex-Blake was the first to qualify, although not allowed to graduate. (A woman masquerading as Dr ‘James’ Barry, took a medical degree at Edinburgh in 1812 and became an army surgeon).
22 November 1869	The most famous nineteenth-century clipper sailing ship, the Cutty Sark, was launched. She was built at Dumbarton on the Clyde by Scott and Linton and was one of only nine ships built by them before financial problems forced their closure. The Cutty Sark was completed by Dumbarton's leading shipbuilders, William Denny Bros. After a varied and eventful career the Cutty Sark now rests, restored and drydocked at Greenwich, London, England.
6 February 1870	Birth of James Braid, golfer and course designer, 5 times Open Golf Champion from 1901-1910, at Elie and Earlsferry.
2 May 1870	New Caledonian Railway Station was opened at the west end of Edinburgh’s Princes Street.
6 May 1870	Death of Sir James Young Simpson, Bathgate-born physician who discovered the anaesthetic properties of chloroform, in Edinburgh. His funeral was a day of public mourning in Edinburgh and 2,000 people followed his hearse.
6 July 1870	Institute of Bankers in Scotland formed, the first such body in the world.
15 July 1870	The Bill passed by Westminster for Tay Rail Bridge, connecting Fife and Dundee, received Royal Assent.
4 August 1870	Birth of Sir Harry Lauder, music hall entertainer and international star, in Portobello.
4 October 1870	George Chalmers, a native of Fraserburgh, was the first culprit to be hanged behind closed doors in Scotland. Chalmers, 45, was convicted of the murder of a toll-keeper at Braco, Perthshire, and was executed by the London hangman William Calcraft at the Old County Jail, Perth.
22 July 1871	Foundation stone of the Tay rail bridge was laid on the south bank at Wormit, Fife.
10 November 1871	Henry Morton Stanley, a Welsh-born American journalist, spoke the immortal words ‘Dr Livingstone, I presume’ when the two men met at Ujiji, on Lake Tanganika, Tanganika, now Tanzania. Stanley’s was one of few expeditions seeking information on Dr David Livingstone’s whereabouts and welfare, and his writings put the seal on the Scottish explorer’s fame.
18 July 1872	Britain introduced voting by secret ballot.
10 August 1872	Education ( Scotland ) Act passed. It provided for a state elementary education for all children, and amended previous provisions in the Acts of 1696, 1793, 1839 and 1861.
30 November 1872	First ever International Football Match in the world resulted in a 0-0 draw between Scotland and England. The game was played at a cricket ground in Partick, Glasgow.
13 March 1873	Scottish Football Association formed with constituent clubs Queen's Park, Clydesdale, Vale of Leven, Dumbreck, Third Lanark, Eastern, Granville and Kilmarnock.
1 May 1873	David Livingstone (born at Blantyre 1813), medical missionary, traveller, philanthropist, died at Ilala, Central Africa.
16 September 1873	Tourism in Scotland received a boost when Queen Victoria cruised the Caledonian Canal on her way to Balmoral. She travelled on the paddle-steamer Gondalier which was built specially for use on the canal. She operated from 1866 to 1939 and was deliberately sunk at Scapa Flow to help protect Royal Naval ships from attack by German submarines.
18 October 1873	In the first-ever tie played in the Scottish Cup, the oldest national football trophy in the world, Renton defeated Kilmarnock 2-0 at the Queen’s Park recreation ground in Glasgow.
16 January 1874	Birth of Robert Service, poet, in Preston, his Scottish father was from Kilwinning. Raised in Ayrshire he emigrated to Canada and through his poetry became known as the 'Bard of the Yokon'.
9 March 1874	Birth of John Duncan Fergusson, artist, one of the leading figures in the development of art in 20^th century Scotland, in Leith.
18 April 1874	Remains of Blantyre-born explorer and missionary Dr David Livingstone were interred in Westminster Abbey, London, England.
31 August 1874	The Aberdeen Tramway Company horse-drawn tramway system opened for public traffic with seven tram cars operated by 56 horses. The first year’s revenue was £5,535.
6 July 1875	The Institute of Bankers in Scotland was formed. “This was the first such body in the world… The apprenticeship system was soon augmented by the provision, by the Institute, of systematic teaching of the elements and evolution of banking and banking law.” S G Checkland, Scottish Banking 493
26 August 1875	Birth of John Buchan, author of successful adventure novels and of historical works, including 'Montrose'. He was MP for Scottish Universities 1927-35, Lord High Commissioner to General Assembly 1933-4 and Governor General of Canada 1935-40.
9 October 1875	The Queen’s Park versus Wanderers match at Hampden saw the earliest known football programme on sale to the fans.
9 March 1876	Scots-born Alexander Graham Bell patented the first telephone literally hours before a similar patent was lodged by American Elisha Gray. The first actual coherent message was transmitted the next day from one room to the next at 5 Exeter Place, Boston, Massachussetts, USA when Bell spoke to his assistant, Thomas Watson, saying "Come here, Watson, I want you."
5 August 1876	Aberdeen-born missionary and teacher Mary Slessor set sail in the SS Ethiopia for Calabar in West Africa. She became fluent in the Efrik language and did much to raise the status of women in Calabar.
13 September 1877	Freedom of Glasgow given to Ulysses Simpson Grant, Civil War general and ex-President of the United States of America.
22 October 1877	Firedamp explosion at Blantyre Colliery, Lanarkshire, killed 207 miners.
14 January 1878	Alexander Graham Bell demonstrated his telephone to Queen Victoria, who made the first private telephone call in the British Isles from her residence on the Isle of Wight, England.
26 January 1878	Death of Kirkpatrick Macmillan, blacksmith and inventor of the bicycle, at Courthill, Dumfriesshire. “Glasgow, June 11^th 1842, On Wednesday a gentleman, who stated he came from Thornhill in Dumfriesshire, was placed at the Gorbals public bar, charged with riding along the pavement on a velocipede to the obstruction of the passage, and with having, by so doing, thrown over a child. It appeared from his statement that he had on the day previous come all the way from Old Cumnock, a distance of forty miles, bestriding the velocipede, and that he performed the journey in the space of five hours. Newspaper account of the first bicycle in Glasgow.
31 May 1878	Opening of first Tay Rail Bridge, designed by Sir Thomas Bouch. It was blown down on 28 December 1879 in a fierce gale with the loss of all passengers and rail crew.
22 September 1878	Robert Louis Stevenson commenced his walk through the Cevennes from Le Monastier-sub-Gazelle. He recorded his French journey in ‘Travels with a Donkey’.
10 January 1879	Birth of Bobby Walker, outstanding Heart of Midlothian player and Scottish Internationalist, in Edinburgh. He won two Scottish Cup medals with Hearts and made his Scotland debut in 1900 and his last international appearance 13 years later. Scotland only played internationals at that time against England, Ireland and Wales and his 29 caps came from 11 appearances against England, a joint record for a Scot, and nine each against the other two nations. When he retired he was Scotland’s most capped player, a distinction he held until 1932. Two years after his death Alan Morton won the 30^th of his 31 caps. He was the most capped player at Tynecastle until Steven Pressley received his 30^th cap in 2006.
5 November 1879	Death of James Clark Maxwell, one of the greatest mathematicians and physicists of the 19th century, born in Edinburgh 1831, professor at Aberdeen and London, he formulated the electro-magnetic theory of light and kinetic theory of gases, the basis of x-rays and thermodynamics.
28 December 1879	Sir Thomas Bouch's new railway bridge across the River Tay collapsed in a storm throwing an engine, six coaches, passengers and crew into the water 160 feet below. Faults in the design and construction were found to blame for the 'Tay Bridge Disaster'.
25 January 1880	Birth of Francis George Scott, composer, in Hawick, Roxburghshire. Son of a supplier of mill-engineering parts he was educated at Hawick and the Universities of Edinburgh and Durham. He studied composition under Jean Roger-Ducasse, French composer, and in 1925 became Lecturer in Music at Jordanhill College for Teachers, a post he held for twenty-five years. His settings included work by Hugh MacDiarmid, William Dunbar and Robert Burns.
23 September 1880	Birth of John Boyd Orr 1st Baron Boyd Orr, biologist and Nobel Peace winner (1949), at Kilmaurs near Kilmarnock. He established the Rowett Research Institute at Bucksburn, Aberdeen and was the first Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the newly founded United Nations in 1945.
28 October 1880	Dr Henry Faulds, a Scots medical missionary working in Tokyo, published a letter in 'Nature' which produced the first evidence that fingerprints taken directly from suspected persons and prints left at the scene of a crime could be used as medico-legal proof of guilt or innocence.
5 February 1881	Death of Thomas Carlyle, Ecclefechan-born historian, essayist and philosopher in London. Rector of the University of Edinburgh (1866) he was one of the outstanding Scots of his generation and was buried beside his parents at Ecclefechan.
27 July 1881	Founding of first ‘Carnegie; library in Andrew Carnegie’s home-town Dunfermline. In recognition of his gift, Andrew Carnegie was made a Freeman of Dunfermline. Between 1881and1917, Andrew Carnegie financed 2,307 libraries world-wide.
27 August 1881	Thousands of people attended the ceremony of cutting the first turf at the Duthie Park, Aberdeen, including the benefactor Miss Duthie and the full-town council. Miss Duthie donated the public park to the city in memory of her uncles and brothers. The park was officially opened in 1883 by Princess Beatrice.
14 October 1881	Eyemouth Fishing Disaster, known locally as 'Disaster Day', some 129 men and boys, one in three of the Berwickshire town's fishermen lost their lives in a hurricane.
22 January 1882	Glasgow’s St Andrew Halls was packed to hear American evangelists Moody and Sankey.
6 April 1882	Statue of Robert Burns unveiled in Dumfries - Scotland's National Bard resided in the town from 1791 until his death in 1796.
11 April 1882	Battle of the Braes in Skye between a posse of 50 Glasgow policemen, drafted in by the Sheriff of Inverness-shire, and tenants of Lord MacDonald threatened with eviction. In 1881 the crofters of Braes inaugurated a fight for crofting rights by withholding rents until Lord MacDonald or his factor returned to them the grazings on neighbouring Ben Lee. Retaliation came in the form of eviction notices leading to the battle between the crofters and policemen who were forced to withdraw to Portree.
3 November 1882	Scottish suffragettes held a ‘Scottish National Demonstration of Women’ in the St Andrews Halls, Glasgow, after the passing of the Married Women’s Property (Scotland) Act by Westminster. The hall was packed to capacity with women being admitted free and men’s tickets selling at 2/6d.
17 January 1883	Birth of Sir Compton Mackenzie, author and founder member of the National Party of Scotland in 1928. In 1931 he was elected as the first ever Scottish Nationalist Lord Rector of Glasgow University.
1 March 1883	Death of George Webster, noted sheriff and criminal officer in the county of Aberdeen, at the age of 83. In the course of his career he arrested seven murderers.
19 March 1883	Statue of David Livingstone, the Blantyre-born missionary, was unveiled in Glasgow’s George Square on the 70^th anniversary of his birth.
3 July 1883	The SS Daphne capsized after her launch from a Linthouse ship yard, 124 workers were drowned in the Clyde's worst accident of its type.
27 September 1883	The Duthie Park, Aberdeen, was officially opened by Princess Beatrice. The public park was donated to the city by Miss Duthie to perpetuate the memory of her uncles and brothers.
4 October 1883	The Boys' Brigade founded in Glasgow by Sir William Alexander Smith. Its stated object was 'the advancement of God's Kingdom among Boys and the promotion of habits of Reverence, Discipline, Self-Respect, and all that tends towards a true Christian Manliness'.
28 January 1884	Scotland defeated Ireland 5-0 in the first football international between the countries in Belfast.
1 July 1884	Death of Allan Pinkerton, Scots-born founder of the American Pinkerton Detective Agency.
28 August 1884	Birth of Peter Fraser, Prime Minister of New Zealand (1940-1949), at Fearn, Ross and Cromarty.
20 September 1884	Nearly 16,000 Dundonians marched to a demonstration meeting on the city's Magdalen Green against the House of Lords' rejection of William E Gladstone's Bill to improve the electoral system.
16 February 1885	Birth of Will Fyfe, music hall character comedian, in Dundee. Best remembered for his playing of a Glasgow drunk singing ‘I Belong to Glasgow’, he also had successful appearances in the USA and acted in films such as ‘Owd Bob’ and ‘The Brothers’.
12 September 1885	A world record score was established when Arbroath FC defeated Aberdeen side Bon Accord 35-0 in the first round of the Scottish Cup. Arbroath forward John Petrie scored 13 goals. On the same day Dundee Harp defeated Aberdeen Rovers 35-0.
11 December 1885	Statue of Alexander Selkirk, Robinson Crusoe, was unveiled at Lower Largo, Fife, by Lady Aberdeen, following a speech by Lord Aberdeen. The bronze statue was designed by Stuart Burnett ARAS and paid for by David Gillies of Cardy House, Lower Largo, a relation of the Selkirks. The inscription under the statue reads – “In memory of Alexander Selkirk, mariner, the original of Robertson Crusoe, who lived on the island of Juan Fernandez in complete solitude for four years and four months. He died in 1723, lieutenant of HMS Weymouth, aged 47 years. This statue is erected by David Gillies, net manufacturer, on the site of the cottage in which Selkirk was born.”
13 March 1886	A new railway at Killin, Perthshire, was declared open. Branching off the Callander and Oban railway at Ardchyle, it ran for five-and-a-half miles and cost £30,000.
15 March 1886	Opening of Glasgow's Queen Street low-level system, the first of the city's three undergrounds.
25 June 1886	Crofters Act became law. Following on from the Crofters Commission or Napier Commission, the Act gave crofters security of tenure, the right to inherit, bequeath or assign crofts, fixed rents and the right for compensation for 'improvements' when they removed. The Act also set up a Crofters Commission to safeguard rights of crofters and deal with disputes, allocation of land, etc. One member had to be a Gaelic speaker.
23 July 1886	Birth of Sir Arthur Whitten Brown, aviator and companion of Sir John Alcock on first transatlantic flight in June 1919, in Glasgow.
15 May 1887	Birth of Edwin Muir, poet and translator, at Durness, Orkney.
28 May 1887	73 miners died in a firedamp explosion at Udston Colliey, two miles from Hamilton, Lanarkshire. As at near-by Blantyre, ten years previously, unauthorised shot-firing was suspected as having triggered the disaster.
20 June 1887	The second Tay Bridge, the longest railway bridge in Britain, was opened.
19 July 1887	Some 5,000 spectators watched the Earl of Elgin and Kincardine, Lord Lieutenant of Fife, and descendant of Robert I, King of Scots, unveil a monument at Pettycur marking the 6ooth anniversary of the death of Alexander III (1249-1286). The audience included Andrew Carnegie and US Senator Blaine.
1 December 1887	Beeton’s Christmas Annual went on sale and featured ‘A Study in Scarlet’ by Edinburgh-born Dr Arthur Conan Doyle, which introduced his detective creation Sherlock Holmes.
13 August 1888	John Logie Baird, the inventor who developed the first workable television system, was born at Helensburgh.
25 August 1888	Scottish Labour Party (1888-1893) was inaugurated, with Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham as President and James Keir Hardie as Secretary, in Glasgow. ‘Resolved that its object be to educate the people politically, and to secure the return to Parliament and all local bodies of members pledged to its programme.”
15 July 1889	New National Portrait Gallery for Scotland was opened in Edinburgh by Marquess of Lothian.
20 July 1889	Birth of Lord Reith, first director general of the BBC 1927 - 1938: Minister of Information and of Transport 1940 and of Works and Planning 1940 - 1942.
5 September 1889	Sixty-three miners died in an underground fire at Mauricewood Pit, Penicuik, the cause of which was never discovered. Most of the miners died from suffocation when smoke entered the ventilation shaft.
17 October 1889	Parisians witnessed a spectacular meeting of Scottish athletes and musicians, advertised as a ‘Gathering of the Clans’. The event was staged in heavy rain in the grounds of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.
4 March 1890	The Forth Railway Bridge, designed by Sir John Fowler and Sir Benjamin Baker, opened for traffic. Total length : 1 mile 1005 yards. Main spans : 1710 feet long, the track 156 feet above high water, the cantilever towers 361 feet high. Death of linoleum manufacturer and Provost of Kirkcaldy Michael Beveridge. He left £50,000 for the purchase of land to create a public park, library and hall in Kirkcaldy. The Beveridge Park was opened in 1892 and the Beveridge Library was established in the Adam Smith Halls with the Beveridge Hall above.
16 June 1890	The Caledonian Railway station in Edinburgh was destroyed by fire.
28 June 1890	At least 60 lives were lost as severe gales battered the Scottish fishing fleet off the north and west coasts.
16 August 1890	The first Scottish Football League programme took place and four matches were played – some 4,000 spectators at Ibrox watched rangers beat Hearts 5-2, 10,000 saw Celtic lose 4-1 at home to Renton, Cambuslang overwhelmed Vale of Leven 8-2, and Dumbarton and Cowlairs drew 1-1. Both Dumbarton and Rangers finished the season on 29 points and after a play-off ended 2-2 they were declared joint Champions.
30 April 1891	An Comunn Gaidhealach, the Gaelic or Highland Association was formally instituted at Oban.
25 June 1891	First Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle was published in the Strand magazine.
29 September 1891	Three painters were killed when scaffolding collapsed on the Forth Railway Bridge which had opened for traffic in 1890.
7 November 1891	Colonel William Frederick Cody, ‘Buffalo Bill’, and members of his Wild West Show attended a football match between Rangers and Queen’s Park at Ibrox. At half-time the legendary American showman was introduced to both teams. The Glasgow Cup tie resulted in a 3-0 victory for Queen’s Park.
16 November 1891	Colonel William Frederick Cody’s, ‘Buffalo Bill’, Wild West Show opened in the East End Exhibition Building, Dennistoun, Glasgow, with stars such as sharp-shooter Annie Oakley. The show ran until 27 February 1892.
4 July 1892	Founder of the Scottish Labour Party James Keir Hardie became the first Socialist to win a seat at Westminster when he took the Essex constituency of West Ham from the sitting Conservative member in the General Election.
11 August 1892	Birth of Christopher Murray Grieve in Langholm. As the poet Hugh MacDiarmid, he set in motion the Twentieth Century Scottish Literary Renaissance. 'A Scottish poet maun assume The burden o his people's doom And dee to brak their livin tomb.'
8 September 1892	Launch of the 12,950-ton Cunard liner Compania at Govan. Built by the Fairfield Engineering Company, she won the coveted Blue Riband trophy for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic (five days, seventeen hours and twenty-seven minutes) and was converted to an aircraft carrier in World War I.
13 January 1893	The Independent British Labour Party was formed by James Keir Hardie.
22 April 1893	Fairfield-built Cunard liner SS Campania entered service. She set a transatlantic record time of five days, seventeen hours and twenty-seven minutes, arriving back from the United States as holder of the coveted Blue Riband.
8 February 1894	Death of Robert M Ballantyne, Edinburgh-born author, in Rome. He wrote more than 90 titles, mostly adventure stories for children, the best known of which was ‘The Coral Island’ (1857).
24 October 1894	A programme of moving pictures was presented for the first time to Queen Victoria at Balmoral Castle. In response to a royal request William Walker of Aberdeen gave a Command Performance of his cinematograph programme including film of that year's Braemar Gathering.
6 June 1895	Birth of staunch suffragette and Scottish Nationalist Annie Knight in Glasgow. She died in 2006 at the age of 111, the oldest women in Scotland, in Aberdeen.
17 June 1895	Birth of Very Rev Lord MacLeod of Fuinary, founder of the Iona Community.
2 February 1896	Socialist Sunday Schools started in Glasgow.
26 February 1896	Waterloo Bridge, Inverness, was opened by Mrs William MacBean, wife of the town’s Provost. The iron bridge replaced a wooden bridge, The Black Bridge, which had stood since 1808. The name ‘The Black Bridge’ lives on for its successor.
14 December 1896	The opening of Glasgow District subway's six-and-a half mile system with 15 stations.
18 February 1897	Kathleen Garscadden, Aunt Kathleen of BBC Children's Hour and a pioneer of early broadcasting, was born in Glasgow.
25 March 1897	The Scottish Trades Union Congress was founded. “The Congress was not, as some imagined, got up in opposition to the British Trades Union Congress, but because they believed that they wanted anything well done they had to do it themselves, and in doing their own work they were in some degree lightening the work of the British Congress. Then there were many questions which affected Scotland particularly, to which their English fellow unionists could not be expected to devote the amount of time and attention they deserved.” From the speech of a delegate
20 August 1897	Ronald Ross, first Scot to win a Nobel prize (1902), dissected an anopheles mosquito and discovered the link with malaria.
26 April 1898	Birth of John Grierson, internationally-renowned documentary film-maker, at Deanston in the parish of Kilmadock, Perthshire.
25 August 1898	Under the Aberdeen Corporation Tramway Act control of the private Aberdeen Tramway Company passed to the City of Aberdeen Council. The manager of the tramway company David Moonie continued in the same role with the council and steps were taken almost immediately to convert the horse-drawn system to electric traction.
9 September 1898	Birth of Sergeant John Meikle, the only 4^th Seaforth Highlander to win a VC during the First World War, at Kirkintilloch.
26 July 1899	Memorial statue to the Highland heroine Flora MacDonald was unveiled on the Castle Hill, Inverness.
23 December 1899	The first-ever electric tramcar in Aberdeen made its first run between St Nicholas Street and Woodside. By 1902 the whole system was converted to electric traction in place of the original horse-drawn system.
30 December 1899	Rangers played their first-ever match at their new Ibrox ground in Glasgow with a 3-1 victory over Heart of Midlothian.
27 February 1900	British Labour Party was formed with Lossiemouth-born Ramsay MacDonald as secretary.
13 February 1901	Birth of James Leslie Mitchell in the Croft of Hillhead of Segget, Auchterless. As the writer Lewis Grassic Gibbon he is best known for his trilogy "A Scots Quair".
21 March 1901	Launch of RRS Discovery from the yard of Alexander Stephen & Sons, Dundee. The ship associated with Captain Robert F Scott, of Antartic fame, returned to Dundee in 1986 and is now a tourist attraction at Discovery Point.
30 April 1901	Glasgow was reported free of smallpox after a sixteen months outbreak which claimed 288 lives.
6 May 1901	Birth of Sir John brown, naval architect and designer of the 80,000 tonne Queen Mary, Cunard Order No 534, launched in September 1934. Four years later he was head of the design team for the Queen Elizabeth.
7 June 1901	The Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland was formed by Andrew Carnegie. “I, Andrew Carnegie, of New York, and of Skibo in the County of Sutherland, deeming it to be my duty and one of my highest privileges to administer the wealth which has come to me, as a trustee on behalf of others, and entertaining the belief that one of the best means of my discharging that trust is by providing funds for improving and extending the opportunities for scientific study and research in the Universities of Scotland, my native land, and by rendering attendance at these Universities and the enjoyment of their advantages more available to the deserving and qualified youth of that country to whom the payment of fees might act as a barrier to the enjoyment of these advantages, hereby undertake to deliver bonds of the United States Steel Corporation of the aggregate value of ten million dollars to be held by the Trustees…” From the Deed of Trust
26 August 1901	Donibristle Mining Disaster in Fife, part of Mossmorran peat bog near Cowdenbeath collapsed on sixteen miners 360 feet underground. Four miners were lost, as was a four-strong rescue party. All the bodies were recovered between September and December.
1 December 1901	As a storm swept up the Forth, the Bass Rock Lighthouse was lit for the first time.
25 March 1902	Death of Maj-Gen Sir Hector Macdonald, crofter's son who rose through ranks of Gordon Highlanders and became known as 'Fighting Mac' for his exploits.
5 April 1902	The stand at Ibrox Park in Glasgow collapsed during Scotland v England match, killing 20 and injuring more than 200. The match in front of a crowd of 70,000 ended in a 1-1 draw and was declared an unofficial international.
10 November 1902	Percival Spencer and the Rev J M Bacon made the first-ever hot air balloon flight from the Isle of Man and landed safely in Dumfriesshire.
9 March 1903	East Fife Football Club were formed at a public meeting in Methil. In 1938 East Fife entered the record books by becoming the first and only ever Second Division team to win the Scottish Cup. 'The Fife' defeated Kilmarnock 4-2 in a replay following a 2-2 draw at Hampden park. East Fife also became the first team from the Second Division to win the Scottish League Cup in 1947. They went on to win the League Cup again in 1949 and 1953, becoming the first club to win the trophy three times, a record not matched until the 1960s by Glasgow Rangers.
1 April 1903	First order placed with Glasgow North British locomotive works which was to build 28,000 locos and become the world's third largest manufacturer.
10 June 1903	The first floral clock in the world was set in motion in Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh.
31 October 1903	Hampden Park, Queen's Park Football Club's stadium, opened in Glasgow. The third football park bearing that name, Hampden became the established venue for international and important Scottish Cup matches.