Helen Crummy

Decided to take a walk to Craigmillar this morning to photograph this statue. It is of Helen Crummy outside the (relatively) new Craigmillar library. Her story is discussed in this podcast https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000sb0h. I was on zoom meeting with her son, Andrew Crummy yesterday - it was organised by Craigmillar Now who are planning a festival in Aug in whatever form it has to take. It was really inspiring and energizing.

Anyway, I knew off this lady and Craigmillar Arts Festival but hadn't seen the statue in real life. It is particularly of note as, apart from Queen Victoria, this is the only other statue of a named woman in Edinburgh. Statues of women are rare but statues of named, actual, real women are rarer.

I used to volunteer in Craigmillar on a befriending project from 1995 to 2005. It has SO changed since those days. Really different vibe and so many flats. It was a good walk. I was amazed how many organisations there seemed to be working in Craigmillar on the call. We used to have a base at Jack Kane Centre when I was befriending.