The Ormlie Lodge Club

This rich social life of the late 1950s was developed before the 1958 opening of the official Dounreay Sports and Social Club (DSSC) at Viewfirth House, in the Brownhill area of the atomic estate. The focus for much of this early activity was the UKAEA’s hostel at Ormlie Lodge, a private house which had been purchased and extended to accommodate 250 single employees or those awaiting housing and the arrival of their families. As a residence for a generally young, vibrant group of people keen to get involved in the social aspects of the community, it was a natural place for a social hub to develop: as Christina Munro explained, ‘that’s how so many clubs and different groups started up because people were young and keen to do this, that and the other and so on – they were young, it was exciting

In the original bar there used to be a fire place and in winter a fire was kept burning and made the bar a warm and cheerful place. A good customer was one fellow known as “Wee Alistair” and when he was well in his cups he would hold onto the bar by his finger tips and swing backwards on the bar stool. He overdid the backward swing one night and fell backwards and landed with his head in the fire. Fortunately it had died down a bit. We rushed forward and pulled him up and dusted him down and cleaned off the singed hair and sat him back on his stool and he demanded to know what the rush was, he said it was the warmest he had been all day.

I remember a few humorous things that have happened over the years, like the night Miss Bentley, the Hostel Manageress, came into the bar to have a chat- she said- and left her walking stick outside the door. She stayed for a while and when she decided to leave, went out and picked up her walking stick only to find it completely covered over in beer bottle labels. Some members realising whose stick it was had gone to the trouble to soak off the labels from the beer bottles outside and then plastered them all over her stick. She was not amused. In those days beer was in bottles or cans, keg beer had not yet reached the Club. One night a bunch of us collected as many as we could carry and went and stacked them, as quietly as we could, into a pyramid outside her door then rapped on the door and beat a hasty retreat around the corner. The door opened and out she came, smack into the stack of cans and down they came with one loud clatter. She didn’t seem to mind this and we heard her say to herself, “Oh, those naughty boys, what will they be up to next?” None of us were under the age of 30 years. However, when she closed the door we quietly removed the cans and returned to our favourite pastime in the bar.

For the first time, discipline of Club members showed some worrying trends and several incidents led to disciplinary action on Club members, those included the following: ….ii) A member was banned for 6 months due to “…removing a flower in a pot” on Sunday 6th May. iii) Following ‘unsuitable behaviour’ a member was banned ‘sine die’ iv) A member was censored after leaving the Club on a scooter carrying a guest who was brandishing a glass of Guinness N.B. Only detailed investigation established that it was Guinness and not Double Century.

Ormlie Lodge Club was the place where parties started. If you were a Hostel resident and in luck, a member might invite you home to supper after the bar closed or if not it was up to one of the rooms to a party. In either case, the essential entrance fee was a carry-out or at least a contribution to one. Money wasn’t plentiful in the old days and it still amazes me how much fun would spring from a few screw tops and a half- bottle. Did half a dozen people really get so merry (note the polite word) on a halfie? During one such party in an Ormlie room some biscuits had been thrown into the window box. The next morning, the occupier of the room was awakened by what sounded like someone banging on the window. Opening his eyes he found himself staring into the face of a seagull which, in trying to snatch the biscuits had misjudged its’ bombing run and clattered through the open window. Anyone who has had to deal with a sparrow falling down the living- room chimney can imagine the problem in getting a skorrie out of a single room in Ormlie Lodge, especially when your dangly bits are unprotected from beak and claw. For the rest of his days in Ormlie he slept with the window closed. But it was a good party for all that and it didn’t stop many more being arranged as the shutters came down in Ormlie Lodge Club.