September

Scotland got three new television stations in September. Border Television and Grampian Television took to the air in 1961, on the first and last days of the month respectively, and BBC Alba launched in 2008, one day shy of a year since the Corporation had opened the doors of its new broadcast centre at Glasgow’s Pacific Quay.

Beyond television, this was also the month in which the founder of the New York Herald was born in Banffshire, and both publisher William Blackwood, and author Sir Walter Scott died.

Sir Walter Scott penned some of the best-loved novels in the English language, despite never being a full-time author. He was also active in the legal and courts system throughout his life, and a friend of the King. Outside of writing, one of his greatest achievements was the rediscovery of Scotland’s crown jewels, which had been put in a box for safekeeping somewhere in Edinburgh Castle, and not looked at for so long that exactly where they’d been stored had been forgotten.

Queen Victoria laid the foundation stone of the new Balmoral Castle in September 1853, not long after Prince Albert had bought the estate on which it sat. The royal couple had previously rented the accommodation for their visits to Scotland, and so loved the place that, when the opportunity to purchase it came up, they jumped at it. It remains a residence of the Royal Family to the present day.