| Heatherbank House | |
|---|---|
 Heatherbank House in 2022 | |
| Type | House |
| Location | Milngavie |
| Coordinates | 55°56′59″N04°18′59″W / 55.94972°N 4.31639°W |
| OS grid reference | NS555754 |
| Area | East Dunbartonshire |
| Built | Early 19th century |
| Architectural style(s) | Georgian |
  Location of Heatherbank House in Scotland | |
Heatherbank House is an early 19th century private house located in Milngavie, Scotland and is one of the oldest buildings in the town. It is the former site of the Heatherbank Museum of Social Work. [1]
It is unclear when Heatherbank House was constructed. John Thomson's Atlas of Scotland (published 1832) clearly shows a building marked as a "Meeting House" in the location of the modern day house. [2] Deeds show that the property/land was sold by James Burns (Scottish shipowner) to John Blackwood (bleacher) on 5 May 1838. [3]
In 1852 the engineer John Frederick Bateman was consulted by Glasgow Council in regard to its water supply. In 1854, on Bateman's advice, a bill was obtained to supply water to Glasgow from Loch Katrine. Alfred Moore (engineer) was appointed as his resident engineer and he purchased Heatherbank on 18 November 1856. Work had commenced on Mugdock Reservoir in 1855 and the first section of the works were opened by Queen Victoria in October 1859, however Moore continued to reside at Heatherbank and continue his work until 1865. [4] [5]
On 15 December 1865 Moore sold the property to Janet McNaughtan (née Blackwood), widow of the Reverend Alexander McNaughtan who was the local presbyterian minister. [6] The Blackwood family had made some wealth owning the local bleachworks at Craigton. Janet resided in the house with 3 of her daughters; Jennie, Anne and Helen, until her death on 31 March 1875. [7]
Janet's son, Alexander McNaughtan (merchant), had left Scotland for Australia before the family moved to Heatherbank, however after the death of his wife he returned to the new family home. It is hypothesised by art researcher Stephen Scheding in his book "The National Picture" that Alexander McNaughtan may have been the last owner of Benjamin Duterrau's lost masterpiece, a large scale version of "The Conciliation". Scheding believed it was taken by Alexander McNaughtan to Heatherbank in 1869 however the picture has not been found. [8] The painting depicts the conciliation of Tasmanian Aborigines by George Augustus Robinson. Scheding's visit to the house to search for the painting was well documented in local newspapers at the time. [9] [10]
After the death of the final McNaughtan daughter in 1904 the house passed into the ownership of their nieces Agnes and Margaret Taylor.
Heatherbank was purchased by architect Frank Fielden in December 1959 who gained some notoriety in Glasgow for designing the Refectory Building of the University of Glasgow, whilst also being a professor there. [11] In 1975 he sold the property to Colin and Rosemary Harvey who opened the Heatherbank Museum of Social Work on the premises. Heatherbank Press Publisher also operated out of the museum. [12] After their deaths in 1993 the museum was moved to the Glasgow Caledonian University.
The house was purchased in 1995 by Peter Mowforth and family. [9] It underwent significant refurbishment works in 2012 which returned many of the period features that had been lost over the years.
East Dunbartonshire is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. It borders Glasgow City Council Area to the south, North Lanarkshire to the east, Stirling to the north, and West Dunbartonshire to the west. East Dunbartonshire contains many of the affluent areas north of Glasgow, including Bearsden, Milngavie, Milton of Campsie, Balmore, and Torrance, as well as many of Glasgow's commuter towns and villages. The council area covers parts of the historic counties of Dunbartonshire, Lanarkshire, and Stirlingshire.
Bearsden is a town in East Dunbartonshire, Scotland, on the northwestern fringe of Greater Glasgow, approximately 6 miles (10 km) from the city centre.
The Burrell Collection is a museum in Glasgow, Scotland, managed by Glasgow Museums. It houses the art collection of Sir William Burrell and Constance, Lady Burrell. The museum opened in 1983 and reopened on 29 March 2022 following a major refurbishment. It was announced as the winner of the Art Fund Museum of the Year in July 2023. It is the only non-national museum to be the outright winner twice.
David Octavius Hill was a Scottish painter, photographer and arts activist. He formed Hill & Adamson studio with the engineer and photographer Robert Adamson between 1843 and 1847 to pioneer many aspects of photography in Scotland.
Sir Joseph Noel Paton was a Scottish artist, illustrator and sculptor. He was also a poet and had an interest in, and knowledge of, Scottish folklore and Celtic legends.
Milngavie water treatment works is a Scottish Water-operated water treatment facility located in Milngavie, Scotland. It is the primary source of water for the city of Glasgow in western Scotland. Part of the Victorian Loch Katrine water project, construction was started in 1855 and the works was opened by Queen Victoria in 1859, replacing the previous water supply sourced from the River Clyde at Cuningar Loop in Dalmarnock.
George McCulloch was a Scottish businessman and art collector who was the mastermind behind the formation of the Broken Hill Mining Company, a precursor of BHP. He was the son of James McCulloch, a contractor, and Isabella Robertson, a farmer's daughter. George's father died of cholera in January 1849 when George was one year old, and he was brought up by his mother, who was assisted by his uncle John Robertson, a farmer.
John H. Gibb was a Scottish-born New Zealand landscape painter famous for his paintings of New Zealand's coast.
John Frederick La Trobe Bateman was an English civil engineer whose work formed the basis of the modern United Kingdom water supply industry. For more than 50 years from 1835 he designed and constructed reservoirs and waterworks. His largest project was the Longdendale Chain system that has supplied Manchester with much of its water since the 19th century. The construction of what was in its day the largest chain of reservoirs in the world began in 1848 and was completed in 1877. Bateman became "the greatest dam-builder of his generation".
James Paterson PRSW RSA RWS, was a Scottish landscape and portrait painter associated with The Glasgow Boys movement of artists. He is best known for his landscape paintings of Dumfriesshire, where he lived, at Moniaive from 1885 to 1905.
The remains of the old castle of Kersland lie about 1.5 miles to the north-east of the town of Dalry in North Ayrshire, Scotland, in the old Barony of Kersland. The River Garnock lies nearby.
Alexander Reid (1854–1928) was a Glasgow art dealer and amateur artist, and friend of James Abbott McNeill Whistler and Vincent van Gogh. He was one of the most influential art dealers in Europe in the early 20th century, exhibiting and selling artworks by some of the finest artists of his period, including the Impressionists, the Post-Impressionists, the Glasgow Boys and the Scottish Colourists. He helped build up the French painting collection of Sir William Burrell. and many of the works he dealt with now feature in major private, civic and national art collections all over the world. Within the Scottish art world he was called Monticelli Reid.
Archibald Campbell Douglas was a Scottish architect based primarily in Glasgow. He designed many churches in Glasgow and Edinburgh, especially those for the Free Church of Scotland.
Helen Paxton Brown also known as "Nell", was an artist associated with the Glasgow Girls. Born in Hillhead, Glasgow to a Scottish father and English mother and she spent most of her life in Glasgow. Best known for her painting and embroidering she also worked in a range of mediums such as leather, book binding and also painted china.
James M'Kie or James McKie (1816–1891) was an apprentice of Hugh Crawford, John Wilson's successor at the Kilmarnock Cross printing business. In 1867, M'Kie published the first facsimile edition of the 1786 "Kilmarnock Edition" or Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect as well as various bibliographies, reprints, special editions, limited editions, etc. of Robert Burns' and other works for the Scottish, British, British Empire or North American markets. He became an avid collector of Burnsiana and put together the largest collection of published in the world at the time, that was eventually purchased by the local Kilmarnock Corporation and housed in the Kay Park Burns Museum.
Alfred Moore was an English civil engineer primarily involved in waterworks. He obtained his engineering training under John Frederick Bateman and worked alongside him for much of his career.
James Morris Gale M. Inst. C.E. was a Scottish civil engineer for the Glasgow Corporation Water Works. He is most famous for his work building the Milngavie water treatment works. The project directed water from Loch Katrine, 36 miles (58 km) to the north, which required the building of an aqueduct to carry the water to the city of Glasgow by gravity.
Alexander McNaughtan was a Scottish born merchant and businessman who emigrated to Van Diemen's Land in 1842. He produced a report for the Royal Society of Van Diemen's Land on combustible mineral substance from the Mersey River.
Kelvingrove House was a substantial mansion in north-west Glasgow, Scotland. The house now gives its name to an entire district of the city.
Peter Mowforth is a British businessman and chief executive (CEO) of Indez Ltd, an online E-commerce agency based in Scotland. He was formerly a Machine Learning, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence expert and co-founded the Turing Institute. He founded the First Robot Olympics.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)