Maybole (South Ayrshire)

Lat:55.3551 Lon: -4.6800

Maybole is a town in South Ayrshire.

It is the ancient capital of Carrick and was a centre for the Kennedy family and the Earls of Cassillis. Maybole Castle was built around 1560 as a mansion house for the Earls, who used it as a winter base.

The town has a long history of small-scale industry, in the form of weaving and leatherwork. Mechanisation brought decline to the town's handloom weaving but the leather trade continued to prosper in the town into the 20th Century. From the middle of the 19th Century, shoe and bootmaking grew from the work of individuals to organised, large-scale industry. A number of factories were set up, and by the 1890s, around 1500 workers were employed in ten shoe factories around the town. Such was the success of these that a chain of Maybole Shoe Shops was established across Britain. The success of the town's shoemakers ebbed and flowed over the years, prospering through gaining large army orders during World War I, but sometimes struggling to keep pace with mehcanisation, changing manufacturing methods and the introduction of new materials. The last link to the town's history of leatherwork was broken with the closure of the Ladywell Tannery in 1969.

Features of the area

• Town
• Industry

South Ayrshire Group

South Ayrshire is one of Scotland’s 32 unitary council areas. It borders Inverclyde, Renfrewshire, East Ayrshire and South Ayrshire.

The area was created in 1996, adopting the boundaries of the former district of Kyle and Carrick and maintaining Ayr as administrative centre.

Elsewhere on the BBC

• BBC Glasgow and West Scotland

Elsewhere on the web

• Maybole community website
• South Ayrshire: Local History
• Ayrshire History
• Wikipedia entry on Maybole