PHILP MILL PLAQUE

KIRKCALDY CIVIC SOCIETY

Location:

Pratt Street

Unveiled:

7th March 2007

Hogarth's Flour Mill was on the site until 1910 when Hogarth decided to move to Bennochy Road.

Alongside the plaque is the mill spindle socket attractively set into the wall.

Speeches were made and then the group made their way to the Abbey Hotel at the bottom of Milton Road for some light refreshments.

Photographs of the event were taken by Don Swanson.

KCS asked Mr Colin Smart of MCA Homes to unveil a plaque near the bottom of Pratt Street, just down from Starks Park and Mill Street.

An old peoples home has been built by MCA on the site of the former West Mill which was also known as Philp's Mill and the plaque is there to remind people of the old mill.

The photograph below, right, shows the old mill that was demolished. Behind the mill can be seen a light stand from Starks Park.

Robert Philp was a rich linen manufacturer who died in 1828. He had been a bachelor and with no family to leave his fortune to, he left a great deal of money in his will so that 'Philp schools' could be built where the children of the poor in both Kirkcaldy and Kinghorn could be educated. Children attending the schools were called "Philpers". The schools closed when the Education Act came into force.

Robert Philp is one of Kirkcaldy's Famous Folk

Robert Philp is buried in the Old Parish Church graveyard, Kirk Wynd. His gravestone lists the amount of money he left !  

The old Philp mill, Mill Street