50 years ago

ALEX Williamson and his family (pictured) found the economic going in Scotland a little hard to take – and it looked like getting worse. They donned overcoats at their home in Inverness and boarded an aircraft for Australia. The family stayed in Melbourne only long enough to make a quick change into summer clothes before coming to Hamilton. They’re the third Williamson family to move from Scotland to Hamilton – and a fourth is due to arrive later this month. “I owned a couple of lorries in Inverness, but with the oil crisis, it was becoming practically impossible to run the business,” Mr. Williamson said. “There is a standard rate of about $1 a gallon for petrol, if you can get it. Where it would have to cost me about $40 for a lorry tyre, I could get one now on the black market for possibly $100. Things are getting very hard over there so we decided to move.”