Author: Ruth Tott

Furnace Village Hall was able to finally fling open it’s freshly painted doors wide on Saturday 23rd after a long 19 months sleep due to Covid to host a well-attended Macmillan Cancer Support Coffee Morning.

Guests were welcomed with a bowl of hearty soup made by Cindy from the Village Shop. This was eagerly ‘washed down’ with tea and coffee, which in turn was soaked up by sandwiches and cake…and plenty of it! All made by bakers within the village. The cups were refilled, the plates refreshed throughout the morning leading up to the raffle with donated prizes, including a print of Furnace from The Harbour Gallery, a hamper full of local produce, Avon products and an amazing Topsy Turvy Cake, very much a team effort from four bakers in the village.

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“ The event exceeded all our expectations” said Ruth Tott, organizer of the day, “We raised a staggering £780 which will go straight to Macmillan to help them offer valuable emotional, physical and mental support when people need it most. This was very much a team effort and want to thank the washer uppers, the servers, the bakers, the ‘meeters and greeters’ for the day.

The sun shone down on Furnace once more for our well-deserved End of Summer Bash – as good a reason for the village to turn out in force as anything recently. With over 200 folk attending the stalls did a roaring trade, and a wide range of produce was on offer from cosmetics, wax melts and Avon toiletries to cream teas, woodcraft, cakes, dog treats, jigsaws and jewellery. Plus the event had Furnace’s very own hairdresser, Lynsey McKinnon on site, cutting hair to raise funds for the school along with Laura Taylor’s wonderful cupcakes. As usual the tombola was a top draw with many happy winners hugging their booty in either bottles or boxes. Outdoor Bingo proved a huge hit too – something we are almost certainly going to repeat at future summer events. And many thanks too to David and Cindy from the Village Shop who ran a street food stall, generously donating all the proceeds from the sales of burgers to the village hall floor fund. In all the day raised £622 to go towards the restoration of the village hall floor, and a jolly good time was had by one and all.

There are many more fund-raising activities being planned over the next few months including a MacMillan Coffee Morning on 16th October, a race and curry night, a cocktail evening, sing-a-long events, a pop-up market in November, and a Christmas Market in December. For more up-to-date info check out the village website and facebook site over the coming weeks and months.

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A fantastic result with Furnace Folk yet again so generous with their donations of chocolates, whisky, wine and other foodie delights along side a couple of reindeer. A big thanks to the shop for promoting the raffle and selling the raffle tickets. There were 23 prizes and the raffle raised £600 Raffle. The money will be split between Shelter, Furnace School and the Church.

https://www.facebook.com/100000110482995/videos/4049265708420405/

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Prizes were given to: Macintosh, Nicola Mclean, the Joynsons, Robbie Bell, Bake, John Gillies, Cameyo, Mow, Alison (Garry’s mum), Adele Sinclair, Alma, David Sinclair, Maureen, Jan Brown, Hamish, Margaret Moncur, Eva Pattinson, Adam and Rachel, David and Cindy, and Phil and Val.

By popular request local historian Duncan Beaton lead a party (with masks on and keeping our distance) around the village pointing out bits of interest linked to Furnace’s history. Redwell Park, for instance, is so named as there was a well at the bottom which had red water due to the iron, the Galloping Brae was down the hill from Auchindrain coming into Furnace at the start of what we know of now as Leacainn Forest Walk, galloping because the horses picked up speed. We saw parts of the old bridge, were shown where shops once stood proud and flourishing and numerous churches stood serving a busy community.

We discovered old bridges, found out about the shops and quite a bit about the characters that trod the well worn paths through the village through the years.

More history walks are being planned, including a trip around the drovers ways in Spring. If you are interested then keep a look out on the village notice board and on Everything Furnace Facebook page or contact ruthtott(at)hotmail.com

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Furnace SCIO is delighted to announce that our bid for a grant from the An Suide Windfarm Community Fund to improve the village hall has been successful. Read more about the grant and other awards made this year in the Awards Summary below.

For Press Release click here (opens in new tab)

Awards Summary click here (opens in new tab)