Money For Old Rope

Today's title is a saying from the days of the hangman, money for old rope... the executioner would supplement his meagre fee by selling the noose after the convicted were cut from the gallows this is but an aside from today's entry.

Again I returned to the docks for today's inspiration. Like all industry be it ship building, steel founding, car manufacturing etc. in addition to the main industry itself there is an often unseen tertiary workforce that is employed in supplying the components, or raw materials to feed the beast. In the case of the Clyde it was sail makers, rope manufacturers, coopers, cabinet makers and their like who all relied on the yards prosperity to sustain them.

Gone are the days of old rope replaced now with the synthetic and brightly coloured. Growing up as I did in Kilmacolm the Birkmyre Park was a magnate for children, swings and monkey bars and acres of beautiful flat green playing fields, trees to climb a putting green and tennis courts all available and all indirectly provided by the sail makers and rope making industry run by Adam Birkmyre. He donated the land for the park to the parish for the benefit of the villagers of Kilmacolm in 1897 and it has continued to be a meeting place, a play area and a place to enjoy lazy summer days for young and those not so young.

Adam Birkmyre and his two brothers owned and operated the Gourock Ropework Company, located strangely in Port Glasgow and founded in 1777, this organisation was world renowned for the quality of the ropes, sails and tarpaulins that they supplied to the shipping and ship building industry and the brothers were very prosperous. At the height of their prosperity they operated mills throughout Europe, South America, India and Australia a truly global business in those early days of commerce. Adam commissioned and had built a beautiful home called Shallot in Kilmacolm in 1884 which still stands today however is now part of the St Columbas school campus but still retains the gothic beauty of the once proud house. The rope works building in Bay Street in Port Glasgow for many years lay derelict after its closure in the 1970s and since has been converted into loft type flats; the building carrying listed status to preserve it as part of the history of this river and its people.

I remember Maggie Birkmyre, who, when I was a young boy, was the last remaining member of the family and still lived in a more modest house in Kilmacolm, she passed away a number of years ago and the last link to the rope works was lost, consigned from living memory to history. I remember Maggie, she was old, small, her face wrinkled, she was beautiful once by all accounts but we children only saw an old woman who by her appearance often scared us. I have always loved rope, the shapes and textures of old rope holding a fascination for me but working with it on the herring boats it became a cruel tool at times ever dangerous under strain of winches and power blocks, creaking and groaning sometimes bouncing across the deck doing a dangerous dance, scattering the hands.

When I saw this bollard and the abandoned rope and chain it reminded me of the cobweb or ropes that I used to jump over when these docks were full and working every bollard holding a ship fast every berth full, a sad reminder today again of the days past but remembrance of the man that has given generations of people in our little village pleasure through his donation of the park and kept many ships and crew safe through the finest ropes in the world

Please enjoy another memory inspired by Harry!