Carbon Valley (2025)
Computer manufacturing plant, Spango Valley, Greenock, Inverclyde My paternal great grand parents were born on farms in Donegal during the great famine. They married in 1872 and came over to Glasgow where Alexander became a platelayer. My grandfather Hugh, who was born in Wishaw, followed his father into that profession. He helped lay the railway tracks into Ravenscraig steelworks during its construction after the war. My maternal grandfather, Patrick Durkin of Mayo, was a miner at Kingshill No.1 pit where he dug coal that fed the furnaces of Ravenscraig. My father Frank was a turner to trade and he worked on parts for aerospace engines. I started my career in the silicon glen and ended it in the distillery industry. For thirty odd years I worked in manufacturing planning and logistics, mainly behind a computer screen. The giant computer manufacturing plant in Greenock where I started out is now a wasteland of abandoned concrete foundations. The two hundred year old distillery an...