My mom, Madge Elliot, who has died aged 95, after 10 years of dealing with Alzheimer’s illness, was a railway campaigner, tennis coach and native activist in Hawick, within the Scottish Borders.
She was propelled into public life within the late Sixties when, with help from the Rev Brydon Maben, she launched into coordinating a marketing campaign to avoid wasting the Waverley railway route, which ran between Edinburgh Waverley and Carlisle Citadel by way of Hawick, from proposed closure.
In November 1968, she was the driving drive amongst those that arrange a petition protesting in opposition to the withdrawal of passenger companies. This attracted 11,678 signatures inside 25 days, and was delivered to 10 Downing Avenue on 18 December 1968. The communication, coordination and energy concerned in managing such a marketing campaign, lengthy earlier than the times of the web, was no imply feat for Madge, who, on the time, described herself as “a mere housewife”.
Regardless of the protests, the road closed to passenger site visitors on 6 January 1969. My mom, although, was by no means ready to just accept the choice, which successfully left her dwelling city of Hawick with out entry to Twentieth-century public transport. Her involvement with campaigns to revive rail companies within the Borders continued for many years, and from 1998, with the Marketing campaign for Borders Rail, started to make an impression. The Borders Railway between Edinburgh and Tweedbank opened in September 2015.
Born in Hawick, to Rebecca (nee Gemmell) and George Robson, each hosiery employees, Madge attended Drumlanrig main and Hawick excessive faculties earlier than leaving in 1942 to do secretarial work for the knitwear firm Robert Pringle & Son, now Pringle of Scotland. She gave up working in 1952 after marrying Bob Elliot, a secondary faculty instructor, to focus on homemaking and elevating their two sons, Sean and me.
Madge had met Bob whereas enjoying tennis on public courts at Wilton Park in Hawick. Amongst a bunch of standard individuals, they established Wilton Park Tennis Membership in 1948. Each certified and have become tennis coaches through the Fifties. They spent their summers on the membership, enjoying and organising matches and competitions for the various juniors who handed via their fingers, and even managing the courts when a council courtroom attendant was now not offered.
When the idea of quick tennis was devised, they grasped the chance and every winter, for nearly three a long time, spent hours volunteering their expertise teaching native kids at Hawick highschool’s video games corridor at weekends. Their devotion enthused numerous younger gamers they usually have been an influential partnership, producing a gradual stream of gamers profitable at membership, county and nationwide stage.
A lifelong socialist, Madge concerned herself in a swathe of Hawick organisations and was all the time prepared to face as much as the powers-that-be for any perceived injustice meted out to the city, her rail marketing campaign an affidavit to her tenacity.
My father died in 2016. My mom is survived by Sean and me, 4 grandsons and 4 great-grandchildren.
