From our files:

TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO June 7 1991

Shipyard scores Orkney hat-trick WORK has begun on a new order for Campbeltown Shipyard, signed last week. It comes just in time to keep the 80-strong workforce employed as the ferry on the slip nears completion.

The Orkney ferry, the last vessel on the order book, will now be followed by an Orkney trawler, which is worth £1.25 million to the shipyard.

This is Campbeltown Shipyard’s third consecutive order for Orkney. The ferry followed the Kirkwall trawler Arkh-Angell, launched last November.

The ferry, Thorsvoe, is due to be launched on June 17 without ceremony and will spend three weeks in the fitting-out basin before being delivered in July.

This is the largest vessel ever built at the present shipyard: 115ft long and 31ft in beam, a roll-on, roll-off ferry designed to carry 16 cars and 96 passengers.

FIFTY YEARS AGO June 9 1966

Whisky store in danger. AMONG the local projects being held up by the cement shortage is the construction of a new £35,000 duty-free warehouse at Campbeltown’s Springbank Distillery.

The contractors, Robert Weir and Son, of Campbeltown, have nothing like the quantity of cement they require for the massive reinforced concrete raft on which the warehouse is to be built.

The firm is using up what little cement it has on the brickwork of the warehouse walls but, unless the situation eases in the future, it is thought there will be a considerable delay in completing the building.

The raft on which the warehouse will be supported will cover some 10,000 square feet and contain 750 tons of concrete and 6.5 tons of steel reinforcing. It is necessary because of the soft clay underlying the building site. If normal foundations and building methods were used, there would be a risk that different parts of the building might sink at different rates.

ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO June 3 1916

Empire Day gift An Empire Day gift of flowers, wild and garden grown, by pupils of Campbeltown Grammar School, was sent to Bellahouston Red Cross Hospital, Glasgow, and was greatly appreciated, as will be seen from the following acknowledgement received by the headmistress of the infant department from the matron:

‘Dear Miss Smith, the children’s flowers are simply lovely. Please tell the little ones how delighted the sick and wounded are to see a sight of something from the beautiful country woods.

‘I am glad to say the ‘boys’ are doing well and, with the Good Father’s help, we hope to see all restored to good health again.

‘Again, warmest thanks to each little heart for their kindness to us here.’