Drew’s introduction to Granton history

In the early days of Granton the area was farmland and one explanation of the name Granton is 'farm by the sea'.

The development of Granton came about by the building of Granton Harbour between 1837 and 1863. The fifth Duke of Buccleuch was the man behind this. Successive Dukes continued to manage the harbour over the years, including the ninth Duke who died in September 2007.

Granton Harbour became a very successful port for coal, esparto grass for making paper, and fishing trawlers.

Trawlers are fishing boats that pull nets along the bottom of the sea behind them to catch fish (trawl).

There were as many as 80 trawlers based at Granton Harbour before the Second World War.

An ice works in West Harbour Road supplied ice to the trawlers to keep the fish fresh.

When unloading esparto grass from the boats, tortoises were found in the grass and fathers who worked on the West Pier would bring these tortoises home for their children.

There was a boat-building company to the west of the harbour which built concrete boats.

Not far from here stood Granton Castle (no longer standing). We use a picture of the castle as our logo.

Close to the castle is Caroline Park House , the oldest big house in Granton.

The Granton Burn runs through Caroline Park down to what was Granton Beach.

Wardie Burn ran under Wardie Square and down to Wardie Beach before being diverted.

On Lower Granton Road the Wardie Hotel, which was converted into flats, stands by the side of the Wardie Burn.

The red brick terraced cottages between the hotel and Granton Square are called the East Cottages. They were built to house the Duke of Buccleuch 's workers and their families while building Granton Harbour.

Flats were built on the site where Devlin's trawler company had their workshops, offices and yard.

Some other boats and ships that used the harbour were ferry boats that crossed over to Burntisland including a train ferry that took wagons full of coal across the Firth of Forth. One of the ferries was called the Leviathon, named after a huge sea monster.

From Granton Harbour, lighthouse boats took lighthouse keepers and their supplies to and from lighthouses around the coast of Scotland.

When large ships enter the Firth of Forth it is required that pilots are taken out to those ships to help the ship captains navigate through shallow dangerous waters that the captains are not familiar with. Pilot boats have been running from Granton Harbour since about 1920.

Two yachting clubs also use the harbour, the Royal Forth Yacht Club and the Forth Corinthian Yacht Club.

At the east side of the harbour there was a small boat-building yard called Martin's. Very little of Martin's yard remains other than part of a launching slip just inside the harbour. Martin's boat yard was burned to the ground in the 1970s.

When the tide goes out there are mudflats at Granton where migrating birds can feed on their long journeys south and when they return.

In Wardie Bay to the east of the harbour there are fossil beds that have been declared a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

Granton Quarry was to the west of Granton Harbour. Stone from the quarry was used to build the harbour, part of Holyrood Palace, and for the statue of Nelson on Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square, London.