ONE of the area’s oldest residents has passed away. Mary McCormick was 104 when she died, having been born in Coalsnaughton, near Tillicoultry, but as a young girl she came to Lassodie, outside Kelty, aged only three.

Mary wrote her life history a few years ago and in it she recalled how her mother had told her how their Lassodie home had no electric lights or running water, when they arrived.

Her father was a contractor working in the local mining industry and while her mother was keen to return to Clackmannanshire, her dad persuaded mum to stay because the pay was good.

In her recollections Mary remembered how she would go to the Goth picture house, in Kelty, to the penny matinee.

She was educated at Lassodie school and then the big school in Kelty, and she recalled how, in 1926, during the General Strike, there was no transport and they had to walk.

When she left school Mary became a house table maid, in Edinburgh. Mary earned £2/6/- shillings a month of which she kept the six shillings and sent the cash home to Lassodie.

Mary also worked in a castle for a spell but in the 1930s she remembered how a lot of businesses closed down in the aftermath of the Depression. Her family moved back to Tillicoultry but later she married and returned to Benarty where they stayed for over 50 years as their family grew up.

She married Tom McCormick, in 1938, in Coalsnaughton, but moved to Walkingshaws Cottage, in Crosshill, where their daughter Maureen was born in 1941 and late brother Ronald followed in 1946. He passed away in 2013.

Tom was a well known vegetable grower in Benarty and the family never had to buy vegetables.

They moved to St Ronan’s Gardens and then to Navitie Park, Ballingry, until eventually moving to Lochleven Road, Lochore, 43 years ago.

Mary was very much a family person but enjoyed painting and decorating and also sewing and loved making her own curtains.

She was someone who had a great memory and loved putting together her life story and also wrote poetry.

Mary is survived by daughter Maureen, grandchildren Elaine and Lynn, and great-grandchildren Greig and Millie.