A visit to Paisley.

One of the great pleasures in being President is that one gets invited to many special places, and recently I was in the Hallowed surroundings of Robert Tannahill's cottage. For those of you who do not know, Robert Tannahill was a weaver in Paisley, 1774 - 1810, who was noted for writing poems and songs in Scots dialect. Tannahill also has the distinction that he was one of the founders and the first Secretary of Paisley Burns Club from their inception in 1805 until his tragic death (by suicide) in 1810. The cottage where Tannahill lived and worked came into the possession of Paisley Burns Club many decades ago and closely resembled the premises he would have known until a few years back when a devastating fire reduced it to a shell. Paisley Burns Club are one of the first, if not the very first Burns Club, to be formally constituted, and their tradition ad history gives them a strength that few can surpass. In the face of this traumatic damage to their premises they set about retrieving the situation and have done a sterling job in breathing new life into the site, and now in place of the weaving room and caretakers accommodation they have a marvellous meeting room with another fine ante room and other facilities. The fire cost the Club many of their heirlooms but several survive having been in safekeeping elsewhere and are now displayed in the premises. As you would expect of a Club of this vintage and origins there are some outstanding pieces in this collection. The Club have also worked to restore their Library and have a range of books that would be the envy of many.

I joined the Club for one of their regular monthly meetings. A dram to toast the Memory of Robert Burns starts the evening, and usual Club business is conducted. Their habit is then to have a paper on a Burns topic, and I enjoyed a brief resume of the magic of Burns Letters, then the second paper (generally on some other Scottish literary topic) was given on the life of Samuel Smiles, a great author and reformer, native of Haddington as was the speaker. These were both well delivered and fascinating papers, If these are typical of the standard of proposal normally given then it is no wonder Paisley Burns Club continues in strength. To conclude the entertainment a wonderful slide show, with hilarious captions, of the Clubs summer bus trip had everyone laughing. John Haining who visited with me gave a few anecdotes of his time as President and I concluded the evening with a few remarks.

We were both presented with a small memento of our visit, a copy of the Club Chronicle which they publish annually as a record of the year. It will bring back many pleasant memories.

Should the opportunity arise to visit Tannahill's cottage, take the chance to view this wonderful place in Scotland's heritage.