Photographs

 

For all my time in whisky, I can safely say I've only ever seen a handful of photographs of Glen Albyn, repeated like some merry-go-round with flashing images. It is a similar situation to that of Glen Mhor (its distillery neighbour above) and an unknown quantity. 

Yet the success of finding many photographs of Glen Mhor - more than I anticipated with 72 and counting - fills me with hope that we can litter this page with images of Glen Albyn. Only time will tell...

I've given credit to the sources of these photographs, or acquired them myself. If you would like to use them, then its only polite to ask and give credit where it's due. 

1917-1919

This photograph heralds from the era when Glen Albyn was used as a US Naval Base (more on that later) and will be a potentially rich period of photographic opportunities. You can already sense the scale of the distillery.

Also from this period of occupation, is the Glen Albyn Manager's house:

1926-1950

This image comes from the collection of Rodney Burtt and his original notes are:

'Aerial view of Glen Mhor and Glen Albyn looking northwest along the northern end of the Caledonian Canal, flowing into the western extremity of the Moray Firth, the Beauly Firth. Strathpeffer lies 20 miles away just to the right of centre.'

We know various aerial shots were taken in the 1980s, but the buildings behind Albyn don't feature the apartments that are apparent on images from this period. So, it is earlier. The football ground gives us some clues as there were various fires and rebuilding/repositioning of stands. So, I'd put this 1930s-1950s for now, noting there is no writing on the warehousing, which does feature in later decades. The football ground does give us a clue, as you can see the single grandstand, which was destroyed a couple of times by fire. Meaning, this particular edition puts the photograph between 1926-1950 - you'll see it in the photographs we've already dated.

You can appreciate the road that divided both distilleries, which was the forerunner to the A9 and the main route north. My research has highlighted by chance it was a right pain to cross as well. 

My thanks to Alan for providing the image and to Rose for processing the original and giving it a new lease of life.

1931

This particular newspaper image comes from the Aberdeen Press & Journal in 1931 and focuses on the Moray Firth fishing fleet, using the canal to head west to Oban. It looks like the boat is passing through an earlier version of the Muirtown swing bridge into the canal locks. But we should focus on the righthand side and the large presence of Glen Albyn. I've talked about this photograph in a previous article.

1940s

You can read the full post about this photograph here and it is labelled pre-1950s, so the expectancy is this is sometime in the 1940s within the distillery malting area.

A fantastic image of Glen Albyn from around the same period. Full details on this image are debated in a previous post.

1966

These two distillery images come from a Saffron Walden newspaper article in the same year, highlighting the success of local farmers in playing a part in the success of Scotch whisky, with Glen Albyn being the main focus of the piece.

1967

A fantastic photograph that takes us into the Filling Station at the distillery. You can read more about this image here.

1970s

Kindly provided by Diageo, this image is likely taken shortly after 1972 when the company acquired both Glen Albyn and Glen Mhor.

1972

This image gives us a rarely seen perspective of Glen Albyn, being around the back of the warehousing and comes during the DCL era of ownership, so I'd expected this to be from 1972 onwards. Potentially taken at the same time as a handful of images of Glen Mhor on the same day. 

1980

Damn those logs, limiting our view of the classic warehouse perspective along the quayside. Again, the scale of the distillery is noted with a pagoda appearing in the background on the rooftop at a distance. Thanks to Canmore for the image.