Bryan Wills' Opening Remarks at Cockenzie:
November 29th 2001

Good evening everyone. Many of you will take one look and know that I am not the Baron of Prestoungrange, your expected host tonight.. I am in fact his fraternal stand in, his elder brother Bryan from Alberta Canada. Gordon alas has been struck down since we were both in Sydney two weeks ago by a very nasty recurring flu style bug and finally took to his bed on Tuesday announcing he would only reappear when he is better! Lady Avril is of course here and so is my wife Joan, and all members of the Arts Festival Team led by Jane Bonnar, Anne Taylor and Sylvia Burgess.

He is especially sorry not to be here firstly because it is a Red Letter Day for the Arts Festival and secondly because so many of you in this room have been significant players and encouragers of what is being attempted. To be invidious I am ‘instructed’ to mention just four: we have our ever patient landlord Mike Shaw, our fist Mural Artist Kate Hunter, Jim Foster who is President of the Prestonpans Historical Society, and our stalwart supporter from as far away as Edinburgh – Peter Drummond Murray, the Chairman of the Scottish Heraldry Society.

So, Why is it A Red Letter Day, and before that What does the Prestoungrange Arts Festival seek to accomplish?

The Arts Festival seeks to use Art based on the History of the Baronies and the Town in every imaginative way possible to create Tourism Interest in this beautiful edge of the Firth of Forth…

And for us Art means whatever is not Science, that divine dichotomy beloved to this day by the truly great Universities. The idea was not our own, it came from Canada, where a German émigré Karl Schutz transformed a township called Chemainus in the 1970s to become a global role model. His town had far less history than there is hereabouts but it had determination and enterprise which we have to match. 2000 locals now welcome 400 000 tourists a year 20 years later. Karl has been here twice to guide us, and will return again in May 2002. My brother and several members of our family including myself have in the past two years visited a host of other centres around the world that have taken Karl’s lead - Mendoornan and Kyogle in NSW, Bowen in Queensland, Kati Kati in New Zealand and 29 Palms in the Californian High Desert. Next October the Global Movement has its conference at Moosejaw, Manitoba and in 2004 we hope they will all come here.

Each of these townships has a similar tale of economic discomfort but of success achieved both by the process of getting stuck in and from the outcomes that emerge. And yes, the naysayers always abound, but we have no time for them tonight!

I said earlier that Art for us is anything that is not Science, so what have we so far included under such a Art Umbrella? What makes today a Red Letter Day?

1. We began two years by asking local authors to write the history of the baronies and their industrial activities. We are up to No 11 and we also have a delightful children’s tale of Morison’s Haven too. Some of those who wrote are with us tonight. The most recent two are published today and, together with Jim Forster’s Association, we have also today republished Tales of the Pans.

2. Looking at the stories told in those booklets it was clear that the pottery activities have been very important, Jane Bonnar had already organised several Exhibitions of Prestonpans Pottery at the Heritage Museum so the objects gathered have been placed at our WebSite permanently on virtual view; and we are now initiating with local potters small scale reproductions of some of the most desirable for sale. Furthermore during 2002 we shall be commissioning from an outstanding potter a 21st Century Prestoungrange Collection, but its still under wraps and more of that later.

3. Thirdly of course we could not resist the lure of the mural. We have gained enough funding for the first five and thereafter are looking for grant aid and local subscription as we move onwards. They do not come cheaply, not I hasten to add because great artists are expensive but because walls that are to withstand a weather pounding and last ten years have to be well prepared. We are absolutely delighted with the first Mural by Kate Hunter just opposite the Gothenburg at the foot of Redburn Road. Tonight we declare it Officially Open and toast it in traditional Scottish muralist style with Silver Birch Wine and Brammle liqueur with the eats later on.

4. And talking of the Gothenburg, many a fine non scientific debate will have taken place since 1908 around its bar until its closure 2 years ago. The Arts Festival has just acquired it and will be reopening just as soon as can be ( probably Spring 2003 ) in bistro format, but capturing on its walls and throughout all that we can of the barony’s, the pub’s and the town’s history. Not least of these captures is to be a microbrewery making Fowler’s ales that have not been tasted in the town for many a long decade.

5. Finally, not too significant except that its free tonight rather than £1 each tomorrow, we have just struck a horse brass to commemorate this evening and if you still attach such artefacts to your bridles, or just nail them to your old beams, please take one home with you tonight as a souvenir.