WHILE most of us were sleeping off the night before on the first day of 2009, one Moray pensioner was up before dawn delivering newspapers.
It’s a routine Margaret McLean, 72, has kept for the last 35 years, delivering newspapers six days a week, for no pay.
Mrs McLean, of Land Street, Rothes, began her round after taking a paper home from the newsagent’s in the High Street as a favour for an elderly neighbour.
She now delivers to up to 10 houses in Land Street, a routine which starts at 7am when she collects the papers from Longmore’s shop.
Mrs McLean, who has lived in Rothes all her life, brought up her three sons, Ian, Calum (known as Lex) and Charles, alone and encouraged them to get paper rounds when they were children.
At the time she also had her own round, helping elderly people who found it hard to walk to the shop, and taking on others when paperboys and girls failed to turn up for work.
She said: “I believed in letting the boys work if they wanted to, and as a result they could buy the things they wanted and it taught them independence.
“My first job was delivering milk at the age of nine and I was able to go to the cinema with the money.” Mrs McLean, who has four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren, continued to deliver papers while suffering from a knee complaint, which had worsened over the years.
She said: “Sometimes it was painful, but I didn’t stop because I like my hobby and didn’t want to let people down.”
She was forced to quit temporarily two years ago while she recovered from replacement knee surgery, and her friend Irene Lowe stepped in to help. However, she returned to her round three months ago, and intends to continue for as long as she can. “I enjoy it because it gets me out of bed in the morning and keeps me going,” she added.
Her son, Lex, who now lives in Houston, Texas, said: “She is always there to listen to others and chat with the old and young folk she delivers papers to.”
Since moving to America in 1996, he often returns to Rothes and stops in at Longmore’s at 6am to collect the papers and deliver them on his original round.
Cathie Longmore, who has known Mrs McLean since she took over the High Street shop in 1971, said she couldn’t do without her.
“On Boxing Day our normal papergirl was late, so Margaret took on her round as well, just to help out. She is very good to us,” she said.