A Forres woman had double cause for celebration at her graduation yesterday, after being commended for her essay into a movement which sought to put Moray’s whisky trade on ice.
Valerie Ash was presented with the Highland Society of London Award for her dissertation entitled Watering Down the Whisky: Alcohol, Abstinence and Temperance in the Scottish Highlands and Islands, 1820-1860.
Gaining her Scottish History degree yesterday, after nine years of part-time study, she encouraged other mature people to broaden their horizons by learning new things.
The former community worker said: “I am a great advocate of studying later in life, learning is available to anyone who wants it.
“I have always been interested in the history of Scotland, and when I heard about the course at Moray College it sounded like a great way to keep occupied.
“I am most interested in social history, and the changes that have occurred in Scotland over the centuries.
“I felt the temperance movement was an area that hadn’t been greatly explored.
“To explain it, I had to look at the place alcohol had in people’s lives and how drunkenness and unsociable behaviour changed attitudes towards it.
“I included parts on the illicit distilling and smuggling that sprung up around Moray during that time.”
