Dundee (photo Hans Musil)
Following my post about dance in Dundee, I thought I would share more of my impressions of the city. We weren’t there long, but even in a couple of hours I found much to inspire me, from historic ships to hysterics on the high street.
Before my trip in February I had only driven through Dundee once, so knew very little about it. A quick look online will tell you that it is the fourth largest city in Scotland and apparently its sunniest! Not that it was very sunny when we were there, but it was February, after all.
On a writerly note
Many of you will know that Dundee is home to publisher D C Thomson. They are still a family-owned business, now calling themselves a media company, but it all started in 1905.
Writers and readers will be familiar with its “People’s Friend” brand, which is the biggest publisher of magazine fiction in the UK. They commission more than 900 short stories every year as well as publishing fortnightly “Pocket Novels”, a novel-length, large-print story. Many of my writing colleagues got their first break with D C Thomson (and many still write for them).
They also publish the Beano and Commando magazines.
Many of us will remember the late and much missed Roger Sanderson.
He wrote romantic novels for Mills & Boon as Gill Sanderson, but started his career writing scripts for Commando.
Did you know…?
The Beano was first published in 1938 and to date has clocked up over 2 billion sales. The only comics with more sales are all based in Japan.
One of their most well known and long-lasting characters is Desperate Dan. His statue struts through Dundee High Street.
Dan is dragging a reluctant Dawg along behind him and you can see a smaller, but quite menacing sculpture of Minnie the Minx following on!
A few short hours…
We only had a few hours to look around Dundee, but we managed to pack in a trip to the V&A Museum. It is housed on the waterfront in this eye-catching building, designed as an upside down triangle.
It’s free entry to see most of the displays, which included the Dundee Tapestry, with 35 panels, all hand-stitched by 140 volunteers and representing the city’s history and its people.
There is also the Oak Room, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh in 1907. The V&A restored and reassembled the room within the museum, and you can now wander through it and imagine you are in Miss Cranston’s Tearooms in Ingram Street, Glasgow.
Two historic ships
This weird-looking vessel is actually a sailing ship, the HMS Unicorn. It was built in Chatham Royal Dockyard and launched in 1824.
She was a powerful sailing ship built for patrol missions, escort duty and as support for the Navy’s ships of the line.
Only two of the forty-seven Leda class frigates remain, the other being the Trincomalee (below), which is now in Hartlepool, where I was lucky enough to see it in 2016.
These two survivors look very different, because the Unicorn has a roof! By 1824 the war was over and she wasn’t required for service. Apparently it was common practice to fit such ships with a roof to protect the hull from rainwater.
The unicorn was “mothballed” , never fitted with sails and served various purposes, including a spell as a gunpowder store for the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich, but in 1873 she was transferred to the the Royal Naval Reserve and towed to Dundee. Sadly I didn’t have the time to visit this lovely old ship, so that must wait for another visit.
One final tale…
Walking through Dundee we came upon this statue, which definitely wasn’t from one of D C Thomson’s comics.
The story goes that in 1878 a local whaling ship brought two polar bears to Dundee for an exhibition in Commercial Street.
One bear escaped en route to the exhibition site and it ran through the streets, causing panic. One woman ran into the a draper’s shop but the bear followed. The poor bear was apparently so enraged by seeing his reflection in a mirror that he destroyed a display before he was tempted out of the shop by a piece of beef and recaptured.
The statue depicts the polar bear chasing a man with a roll of material up an iceberg plinth onto its overhanging edge and is sited directly outside the draper’s shop (now a newsagent).
Maybe….?
I can’t help thinking that this story might have made its way to Hollywood and inspired the writers at RKO to write the script for a certain box office smash (suitably embellished, of course)!
And on that thought, I shall stop rambling and get back to my own writing.
Don’t have nightmares!
Thanks for this glimpse of Dundee, Linda. I started my writing career with D C Thomson, writing stories for their “picture paper” for little girls, called Twinkle. Two of their editorial staff arrived in London every year and held court in St Ermin’s Hotel in Victoria to talk to their writers and artists. They were lovely.
Me, too, Liz. My very first published story appeared in, of course, the People’s Friend. They changed the title. They also changed “I’m dying for a cup of tea” to “I’m desperate for a cup of tea” because death must never be mentioned in the PF. 🤣
How interesting, Joanna. I always aspired to a People’s Friend story but never made it, sadly.
How interesting, Joanna – I always aspired to having a story published in People’s Friend, but never achieved it. Ah well. Thanks for popping on here.
Forgot to say… The V&A Dundee looks more like a ship’s hull to me. Splendid, though
It is certainly easily recognisable! I do love the building’s reflection in the water, though!
A fellow Scottish Country Dancer loaned me a copy of the book “Celebrating 100 years of The Royal Scottish Country Dance Society”.
I’m interested to see in it the Baldovan Reel devised in 1960 by Douglas Henderson. He worked for D.C.Thomson for 53 years!
(Baldovan is a suburb of Dundee)
Wow, Philippa, thanks for that, it neatly ties up some threads in my post 🙂
I understand that Scottish Country Dancing is very strong in Dundee – we were actually staying there with friends we met through RSCD! Thanks for dropping by.