Former head teacher Marjorie Reid, 99

Marjorie Reid, a former teacher who spent 95 years living in the same house in Tain, has died aged 99.

She taught at Scotsburn and Logie Easter Schools in Easter Ross before becoming head teacher at Fearn School.

All her life, she was never exactly sure where she had been born.

Her father, Alexander, was a blacksmith and the family lived at the smiddie on the road to the port, and then at Rockfield.

Blacksmiths moved around at different times of the year to work with horses, and since she was born in August, Marjorie favoured somewhere north of the port as her birthplace.

Her father had married her mother, dressmaker Margaret Fraser, in 1911, and she had three siblings – Robert (Bertie), Katherine (Kathleen) and Margaret (Peggy).

Marjorie herself was occasionally called Ara.

Working close to the fumes of a blacksmith’s forge was hazardous and it badly affected her father’s health.

He was forced to give up work and the family moved to Tower Street, Tain, when Marjorie was four. It was to be her home for the rest of her life.

Marjorie’s mother, with a family to support, became the breadwinner, combining her dressmaking with cleaning work.

She was determined to direct her children into meaningful occupations and she managed to send Marjorie to teacher training college at Jordanhill, Glasgow.

Marjorie completed her studies, returned to the family home in Tain and took up her first teaching post at Scotsburn.

She then moved to Logie Easter School, then Fearn, where she eventually became head teacher.

She was also a keen cyclist, badminton player, bowler and a gifted golfer.

Marjorie retired from teaching in 1982 and went on to help catalogue Tain’s photographic archive and learn Gaelic.

EDUCATION: Marjorie taught at schools in Easter Ross.