This is a reread for me, as we're planning a trip to Scotland and I want to familiarize myself with the country from a lot of angles. It's a well-done book, though I can't follow the technical commentary at times, and had to look up terms online.

Amongst the untold stories and first-hand accounts by former keepers and their family members is one tale told by a retired fisherman from Shetland who recounted the story of when his aunt, Mary Anderson, became a local casualty of the Second World War after a German bomb was dropped in the vicinity of the Out Skerries Lighthouse on Shetland.

In general they are either the most accurate mapping of a specific area that was available at the time or document previous works that had been carried out on a specific place where the Stevensons were working. This is particularly the case for ongoing harbour and river works. Some of these reference plans have been annotated by the Stevensons in relation to the specific project for which they were used, while others are simply unmarked copies. There are two types of building plans in the Stevenson archive – those relating to industrial buildings and those relating to civic buildings in Edinburgh. Those relating to industrial buildings include farms and quarries but are predominantly of mills. This was likely associated with the family’s ongoing expertise in river engineering and the manipulation and movement of water. Geographically, these plans of industrial buildings range across all of Scotland and date from across the nineteenth century.

TIDESPACE TALKS LAND series starts with a conversation with TIDESPACE Writer In Residence Bella Bathurst. Her acute first hand observations on a contemporary farm, of the significant changes in relationships between one generation to the next and with and within the same land in her book FIELD WORKS - What Land Does To People & What People Do To Land makes a very significant read. There were other forces arrayed against the solutions as well, such as a fear that French invaders would use the lights to set safer courses --- a genuine worry given that construction was going on during Napoleon's time. And the civil authorities felt like it was a private problem for ship owners, not something that society should spend money on. The majority of the plans are of specific harbours and range from town plans showing the outline of the harbour from above to specific cross sections of the design for harbour walls themselves. Larger scale harbour plans tend to be based on Admiralty charts and to show local marine conditions that may influence the proposed harbour. Many of the harbour plans show work in progress and seem to have been created for the use of the engineers’ office, showing alterations to the design, damage done to the work in progress by the sea and proposed repairs. Donald S Murray is the author of non-fiction, fiction and poetry, with a particular focus on Scotland’s islands. His books include the acclaimed As the Women Lay Dreaming, The Dark Stuff: Stories from the Peatlands and The Guga Hunters. His work has received widespread critical acclaim and has been shortlisted for both a Saltire Society First Book Award and the Callum Macdonald Memorial Award. Donald was awarded the Jessie Kesson Fellowship in 2013, and received the Robert Louis Stevenson Fellowship, an annual award which allows Scottish writers to enjoy a month-long residency in France, in 2012. In 2020, Donald was awarded the Paul Torday Memorial Prize for As the Women Lay Dreaming.

Robert Stevenson is most famous for the Bell Rock Lighthouse

Memorials to Stevenson [ edit ] Robert Stevenson is remembered on his grandfather's grave in the churchyard of Glasgow Cathedral, though he was buried in Edinburgh Stevenson's gravestone, New Calton Burial Ground, Edinburgh How the family ran the business and became the driving force in lighthouse development is meticulously discussed in a tale that has one rivetted to the seat ... and thankful to be there and not in the Atlantic wastes! Regent Bridge, designed by Archibald Elliot. (Stevenson carried out feasibility study and was in charge of construction) The building and monument plans in the collection are generally very large scale plans depicting individual buildings or streets in significant detail. They may be useful in providing a very detailed representation of parts of central Edinburgh from the first few decades of the nineteenth century. In October 1958 the Dalen light was replaced by a temporary watched light (Notice to Mariners No 22 of 1958 refers) which exhibited one flash of 3 seconds duration every 10 seconds which remained in operation until 6 August 1959 on which date the present light (Notice to Mariners No 11 of 1959 refers), which exhibits one flash every 10 seconds, was re-established.

Books may nurture the soul but lighthouses save lives and the Stevenson dynasty had a monopoly on their construction. Around Scotland's coastline, they built 97 in almost two centuries of frenetic activity. For four generations, one Stevenson followed another into the business, confronting everything the filthy sea could throw at them. Theirs is an enthralling story, vivaciously recounted by Bella Bathurst.In 1797, he was appointed engineer to the Lighthouse Board, succeeding to his stepfather's place there. In 1799, he married Smith's eldest daughter Jean, who was also his stepsister, and, in 1800, Smith made him his business partner. In 1786, the Northern Lighthouse Trust was established and a few years later Robert Stevenson was appointed their Chief Engineer. It was the beginning of a partnership spanning almost two centuries and four generations of the same family, who became known as the 'Lighthouse Stevensons'. This includes the radar team at Sumburgh Head Lighthouse helping to prevent the destruction of the British Home Fleet in Scapa Flow, as well as a keeper rescuing a survivor from a German U-boat which had been blown up by hauling them by rope from the foot of a cliff.

Without a regular income, Robert’s mother was left to bring up young Robert as best she could. Robert received his early education at a charity school before the family moved to Edinburgh where he was enrolled at the High School. A deeply religious person, it was through her church work that Robert’s mother met, and later married, Thomas Smith. A talented and ingenious mechanic, Thomas had recently been appointed engineer to the newly formed Northern Lighthouse Board. Whenever I smell salt water, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors,’ wrote Robert Louis Stevenson in 1880. ‘When the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father!’The Northern Lighthouse Board (NLB) is the General Lighthouse Authority (GLA) for the waters surrounding Scotland and the Isle of Man and is responsible for the superintendence and management of all lights, buoys and beacons within this area. NLB has provided this essential safety service to mariners for over 200 years. Historic Scotland, Scran, Canmore, The National Collection of Aerial Photography (NCAP), The Engine Shed, Stirling Castle and Edinburgh Castle are sub-brands of HES. At the age of 30, Stevenson had done well for himself. Raised in poverty, his father died when he was young and he was largely self-taught. He became an engineer for the Northern Lighthouse Board in 1797, inspecting the few warning lights for seafarers that then existed along the Scottish coastline. The Lighthouse Stevensons: The Extraordinary Story of the Building of the Scottish Lighthouses by the Ancestors of Robert Louis Stevenson". Booklist. 1999-09-01 . Retrieved 2023-02-09. A thoroughly enthralling book on the building of many of the lighthouses around the Scottish coast. Of course, the famous Stevenson family were responsible but thankfully RLS decided that the life of an engineer was not for him. In fairness he did give it a try but couldn't wait to get out and start writing and in addition he did pen 'A Family of Engineers' that recorded the Stevenson family tradition in the field, or more appropriately on the water.