Helensburgh planning Walk of Fame

Helensburgh was founded in 1776 by the local landowning Colquhouns and named for the wife of then head of the family, Sir Iain Colquhoun. From a recent list drawn up, in its 232 years of existence, 75 people of note have been born in, lived in or passed briefly through the town. There is now a move to kick start local regeneration through developing civic pride, with the first step being the ‘Helensburgh Heroes’ campaign. This aims to construct a Hollywood-style Walk of Fame on the Promenade, commemorating these people. Their number includes the actress Deborah Kerr; the (seven month) Prime Minister Andrew Bonar Law; inventor of television, John Logie Baird; steamship pioneer Henry Bell; artist and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh; poet WH Auden and othrs. The list is not without contention in terms of the strength of connection with the town of those named on it. Mackintosh simply designed Hill House, an architectural jewel now run by the National Trust for Scotland. Auden taught for a short time at Larchfield School and actually called Helensburgh ‘a snob town’. (On this matter, a resident of Furnace who lived in Helensburgh for a time talks of being quizzed by an acquaintance there as to whether he had his milk delivered. The answer informed the enquirer of the social standing of the person in question. Only the big houses on the hill had their milk delivered Everyone else had to collect their own from a shop.) Some names on the list have earned their place today – like Emma Sanderson, the youngest sailor to complete a solo circumnavigation of the world. The “Helensburgh Heroes’ campaign needs to raise £28,000 to build the star-studded Walk of Fame. And why not? It’s a bit of fun and there are people on the list who are unlikely to be commemorated anywhere else. This project would see them redeemed from time.

(Inveraray will want to know if writer Neil Munro is on the list. One of Argyll’s best known writers and a great press man for much of his working life, he was born and raised in Inveraray but lived and died in Helensburgh.)