Interviews of Margaret and Jean Templeton

Interview with two sisters, Margaret and Jean, who came to Stranraer in 1929 when their father, an optician, chose the area as a base for his business. As well as customers coming to him, Mr Templeton travelled around Wigtownshire, by car. As well as discussing the World War 2 era, the sisters also share their memories (especially Jean, who worked alongside her father) of pre-NHS treatment and also then the implementation of the health scheme. Margaret recalls that there was a great increase in business after the scheme was introduced, and also remembers that people were often disinclined to answer the newly introduced questions, such as 'what is your date of birth?'.

The interview then turns to memories of schooldays and the sisters provide lots of detail about school in Stranraer, including: the classroom layout; subject studies; teachers and specialist classes. The sisters also talk about the effect of the war on their schooling and recall that Stranraer was packed with people from 1940 with soldiers based in the camps around the town and the trains taking soldiers from the evacuation at Dunkirk to camps in Ireland. They also speak about different individual houses in town where soliders were billeted or which were completely taken over for army purposes and about blackouts and activity around the bay. Towards the end of the interview the sisters talk about different shops in the town and tell an anecdote about cows being led up through the town after coming off the boats on cow Friday.