Ruined Church

The ruined church here in East Calder was dedicated to St Cuthbert in the 12th century by the Bishop David de Bernam who also consecrated the Kirk of Calder (yesterday's blip) and St Michael's Kirk in Linlithgow, and St Cuthberts at the west end of Princes St Gardens the same year. The annual tithes of East Calder's church were given to the monks of Kelso in the Borders.
The three Calders villages ( East, Mid & West) lie to the west of Edinburgh in the lee of the Pentland Hills. Three rivers meet and merge at Mid Calder - the Almond, the Linhouse and Murieston Waters which all flow down to Cramond on the Firth of Forth.
In this area James "Paraffin" Young patented the production of oil from the shale rock. For a time Scotland led the world in oil development here in West Lothian By 1871 there were over 50 oil works producing 25,000,000 gallons of crude oil a year which transformed the villages overnight into prosperous industrial towns producing paraffin, petrol and candle wax. Dr. David Livingston laid the foundation stone for the Addiewell works, West Calder, in 1866 whilst home on leave from Africa.