MUSEUM'S OLD DUNDEE TOWN MODEL

Another display in the museum from the 60's/70's era was this model of the old Dundee town centre, a very impressive piece of work laid out on a large table.
The problem I had with it back then however, when I was school age, was trying to figure out where it was. Everything South of Reform Street just looked completely alien. Of course that was pretty understandable as most of what was in the model had disappeared from the town centre. So the Overgate didn't resemble how it was , and the city square wasn't in the model either! Now that I am quite familiar with images of how Dundee looked way back in these very old days, I'd get on a bit better I reckon.
Having said that, you'll notice that the model has numbers on the roofs, well they had an identification index on the side of the display so you could match them up and read about the details of each individual building.
To help you make sense of the photo, the corner area, top right, is Boots/Reform St corner, which means the buildings to the left of it are the Overgate/High St area. The main building with #1 on the roof is the Town House - where the city square now is.
The superb model was made by C.G.L. Phillips & Alexander R Fair.

MID 70'S AIR SHOT - DOCK ST / PRINCE'S ST AREA

Continuing the mid 70's flight over Dundee, here we are at the area around Dock Street, Arbroath Road & Prince's Street (all the way up Albert Street).
The green patch, bottom left, is Corporation buses parked in the depot.
Quite a lot of demolition being done around here too as you can see by all the voids where there were once buildings. One such building that I used to go to that is not in this image was located in Robertson Street, just off Arbroath Road nearest to Prince's Street crossroad. This was the late 60's period. There was a large works called Taybridge Products and in this building they had the "Dundee Alsatian & Training Club". Well the room the club used also doubled as a 5-a-side football venue. I used to go there once a week in the evenings, which was organised by the BB, and had some brilliant games of football there. The photo just has it as wasteland but it is now the site of Taybank Medical Centre.
You can also make out the red & cream Tay Spinners mill in Arbroath Road which is now flats.

MID 70'S AIR SHOT - CITY CENTRE

In the mid 70's, my brother went on a flight around Dundee. Luckily for us he had his camera with him and managed to capture quite a lot of the city, some of which looks much different to how it is now. I must have around 40 aerial shots from the session but I'll just put up 6 over the coming days to give you a reminder of how the toon looked back in the day.
So settle down in your seats and get ready for take off...
Starting off bang in the centre of town, where you can see by all the workers huts around it that they were still putting the finishing touches to the new Tayside House at the bottom right of the picture. The most obvious observation though is the giant gap where they demolished the old Wellgate and South side of Victoria Road.
The fact that the photos were taken out of the plane's window means they are not going to be high definition clarity but they are still good enough to make out where you are and what's what, so I recommend for those who would like to do a kind of Retro Google Earth on them, to click on the image to get the large version, then right click to "save picture as" and save it onto you pc, and then you can use your zoom & pan to have a wee nosey around.

TINDALLS ADS - 1980's

Tindalls opened for biz in Castle Street around 1980ish.

I think I'm right in saying that this is the pub that had the bare floorboards, which was a bit of a novelty at the time.

Why I'm not 100% certain is because my memory is doing battle with Cactusville, another pub that opened in Castle Street around about the same time.

Anyway, Tindalls used to put bands on fairly regularly.

The advert here displays a typical kind of line-up they had entertaining weekly.

I know Havana Swing, Some Bad Shirts and The Divorce Brothers are all local bands, but I'm unsure if Streets Of Nowhere, Kashmir and Daylight Robbery were Dundee based.

So, it's up to you now to help fill in the details.

The place closed down in 1988.

The top ad is dated 1981.

Mid ad is May 1986.

Bottom notice is January 1988.

THE WELLGATE WATERFALL - 1986

The Wellgate waterfall was installed in 1978. It was constructed of 2 curtains of plastic wires down which trickled water into a pool below. There were also 3 small fountains shooting water upwards in-between the 2 main curtain cascades, and the whole installation was illuminated by coloured spotlights set in the base of the pool.
As the water feature became the focus of attention, people started to throw coins into the pool like a wishing well, and every so often the pool would be dredged with the money going to charity.
The surrounding plants increased in quantity as time passed by until it eventually took on it's oasis-like appearance above, which was taken on 30th November 1986.
Photo by DC Thomson.Tints by GG.

THE MURRAYGATE - 1973

The 3 shops in the photo taken in the Murraygate in 1973 are :
Dolcis shoe shop.
The golden fronted one is the fab & groovy Miss Lewis, female boutique.
The green marble place next to it is Hendersons furniture store.

FOSTERS - THE WELLGATE - MID 80'S

Smart, but casual..!!

McGILL'S SPORTS DEPARTMENT

The McGill's Sports department was in a seperate building from the main McGill Bros store. Both were located in Victoria Road but their sport shop was on the bottom corner of Hilltown. I used to visit this shop quite a lot in the early 70's when I was secondary school age, mostly for futba gear, but I can also recall buying a pair of Speedo swimming trunks, when their new "nylon" material made it's first appearance. I remember being really chuffed when I got a pair of Adidas Samba trainers from there too. Classics!!
The image above was taken in 1976.
Photo by DC Thomson.Tints by GG.

THE BARRACUDA - MARKETGAIT

The location of The Barracuda in the Marketgait was probably the most well known and most visited disco spot in Dundee.

Previously called the J.M, the nightclub was transformed into the Barracuda in 1975 after £1/4 million was spent on it's conversion, and had a new look design that was extremely eye catching.

Both the outside & inside were "sculpted" to resemble cave-like structures.

The interior's theme was based around Jules Verne's submariner adventure "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea"

There were alcoves, recesses, cubbyholes and bay areas all over the place. Lots of stalactites and submarine parts too - riveted girders, periscope, portholes etc.

To go with this tropical underwater look, it also had aquariums containing piranhas!

There was also an upstairs balcony area with a desert island look, a shack, palm trees, totem pole, bamboo and such like.

The Barracuda was then sold to Rank Leisure in April 1980 and £35,000 was spent on their new lighting system.

Boss, Murdo Wallace Jr, went onto be a soul band promoter and the new Barracuda manager was now John Muir.

Barracuda then got another £1/4 million face-lift in January 1984 and re-opened in March '84 as Coconut Grove.

For a glimpse of the Barracuda interior, have a wee nosy at the slideshow below.

Photos by DC Thomson.Tints by GG.

FLUORESCENT HOOPED SOCKS - 1974

A wee shoe shop in the Murraygate called "Lotus" sold these hooped socks in 1974.

Hooped socks were already popular with teenagers at that time because of glam-rock music fashions, but those ones were generally referred to as Slade socks because Noddy Holder famously wore them on stage.

Why these ones above stood out from the crowd and differed from Slade socks slightly was because they were fluorescent. This was the first time fluorescent colours had been used in fashion, way before punk and the term Dayglo became known.

The trousers were usually worn "half mast" to show them off!

CHEQUERS - NETHERGATE - 1981

Chequers position in the Nethergate was reflected by those who used to drink there - half were townies and half were students.

It opened around 1980 and was a cheery, civilised place to mingle - even on the nights it was crammed.

As well as a jukebox up on the wall, it had "Commedia dell'Arte" themed paintings hanging up around the pub - Pulcinella and co, as above.

Its interior was done in typical 80's ever popular green, hence this caption colour!

THE CRYPT - PRINCES STREET - 1978

Opened in the late 70's, the Crypt was a fashion boutique run by Billy Mackenzie.

As its name suggests, the shop had a dungeon-like theme which was evident on the inside as well as the outside decor.

There were coffin shaped changing rooms & dead animals indoors (stuffed, of course), with a wrought iron portcullis on the doorway & window outdoors.

The gear was a mix of classy retro clothing and modern designer garments.

The shop then changed to "Plan 2" in the early 80's when Billy's brother took over.

Below is a short film clip of the shop doorway with Billy saying a wee word about it.

Photo by DC Thomson.

THE OLD WELLGATE

2 images of the old Wellgate before it became what it is today.
Above picture was taken in the mid 70's when the street was closed down to make way for the demolition team to do their stuff.
Below is footage that was shot in the late 60's showing the street still open for business.

THE OTHER RECORD SHOP - OVERGATE

Some of the albums here in the window of The Other Record Shop taken in 1984 are - Roger Waters, Psychedelic Furs, Bob Marley, David Bowie, Human League and Echo & the Bunnymen.
The shop also sold concert tickets which is why there is a poster advertising Bob Dylan tickets on the window, although that was for a gig out of town as Dylan has never played in Dundee.
They also had a variety of rock t-shirts and comics on sale.
The advert dates from April 1985 and is a reminder that they also stocked a variety of jazz records.

Photo by DC Thomson.

MR BEAUJANGLES - OVERGATE - 1970's

Mr Beaujangles was a fashion boutique dreamt up by Dundee businessman, Ian Dand.

His first store opened in the Overgate in November 1973, with well known Scottish DJ, Stuart Henry, doing the opening ceremony. That was soon followed by shops opening in Aberdeen and Edinburgh.

The stores were targeting the 16 to 25 age group and closely followed the latest London fashion styles. 

Mr Beaujangles also came up with the novel idea of having go-go dancers perform in cages at weekends, to attract custom.

Later, 2 more shops were added to the Dundee collection - one in the Wellgate and another in Commercial Street. However, when all 3 stores were operating at a later stage, they dropped the "Mr" part from their business name and just settled for being called "Beaujangles". The main reason for this was that they introduced a female clothing section, thus becoming unisex stores.

However, it all crashed to a halt in April 1982 when Beaujangles closed its doors for good.

The top image is how the shop looked in 1978 in the Overgate when it was still called "Mr Beaujangles" and so too the shop carrier bag from the same era.

LIZ McCOLGAN PARADE - 1986

This is Liz McColgan ( although she was still Liz Lynch at this stage in her career ) and her Team mates being paraded down Reform Street in an open top bus in 1986. This was to celebrate her winning 2 gold medals at the Commonwealth Games that year.

THE MUSEUM IN THE 60's

When in town in the 60's, I used to like to pop into the Albert Museum (as it was called then) before jumping on a #26 bus back home.

The entrance was on the corner of the Museum nearest to Commercial Street.

Some of the exhibits on show were, McIntosh Patrick's famous "Tay bridge from studio" painting, a weird ethnic shrunken head, lots of stuffed animals & birds, dugout canoes, a mock up of 2 old Victorian house interiors, a scale model of the old city centre/Overgate area, crystals & rocks ( with ultra violet light ), and of course, the Tay Whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling.

THE KEYHOLE - NORTH LINDSAY STREET

The Keyhole in North Lindsay Street, opened in the early 80's.

It was owned by ex Ice Hockey player Marshall Key, hence the wordplay related pub name.

The interior was very spacious, with a sunken serving bar in the centre of the floor.

It also later had large screens, as I recall it being packed with Scots fans watching a match one time I was there.

BOY MEETS GIRL - OVERGATE - 1974

Boy Meets Girl in the Overgate, was Dundee's first go at a "Unisex" boutique in the early/mid 70's - the concept being to sell gents & ladies clothing from the same shop, rather than from separate stores or departments as it had been up to that time. You can see the window display has both male and female garments mixing with each other.

It's a pity it was a rather short-lived store because despite the place selling all the latest up-to-date gear around, it also had the best shopfront logo on town!

Photo by DC Thomson.

DUNDEE'S THIRD BRIDGE - 1980's

First there was the Rail Bridge, then the Road Bridge and finally this piece of modern sculpture, called "The Bridge". This one was erected around the early 80's in Hunter Street, Blackness/Westport area, and made by artist Ron Martin. It was of course the kind of bridge you would have on a cello or double-bass. You can just make out the 4 notches along the top where the strings would go.