'She loved the Usher Hall, opera and creme de menthe'
The poignant stories behind the memorial benches of Princes St Gardens
They are as much a part of the fabric of Princes Street Gardens as the floral clock, the squirrels and the Castle views.
The memorial benches which line the Gardens’ pathways are a refuge from the hustle and bustle of the city centre. A place of escape for office and shop workers, picnicking families and assorted wanderers, from high court lawyers deep in thought to curious tourists.
The benches are one of Edinburgh’s great levellers. All are welcome to rest here. It is the same with their simple metal plaques, memorials displayed without fanfare, celebrating lives as wonderful and varied as any attempt to capture a slice of Edinburgh life.
There are so many pleasant distractions in the Gardens that it is easy to overlook the plaques. But it is a shame to miss them and the stories they hold.
Where else would you find a bona fide musical legend rubbing shoulders with a first-time author and a dedicated parks manager? Here is a cast to match any of sprawling Victorian garden cemetery with their line-up of the great and the good, but more varied and surprising.
In the Gardens, tales of “ordinary” lives lived to the full, sit gently alongside those of outstanding courage, dedication, generosity and joie de vivre.
Every August for 30 years or more, Lean Scully would leave her home in Ireland for Edinburgh, or more precisely the Edinburgh International Festival.
Husky voiced from chain smoking, strikingly tall and gregarious, she was an unmissable fixture at opening nights.
She often talked of moving to Edinburgh, but always ended up returning home to Dublin where she ran a successful PR consultancy, only to come back the following year for more Festival shows - and more parties.
"Music and the great artists were her passion. She loved the symphony orchestras, the string quartets, the concerts and ballets. She stayed in the best hotels, bought £l,500-£2,000 worth of tickets each time and entertained her many friends lavishly," fellow festival regular Tony Ó Dálaigh told the Irish Times following her death, at the age of 72, in 2005.
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