Summer Showers or Pennies From Heaven

The former St Hilda's Episcopal Church

Each summer our disposable income was considerably increased from the wedding scatters - the showers of money - the poor-oots - that would emerge from the wedding party cars.

One great bonus of living at 6 Oxgangs Avenue was that we were located almost directly opposite St Hilda's Episcopal Church, alas no more, so we were always clued in when any such an event was taking place.

St Hilda's was an iconic building in its way built in 1966 to a very modern design which was quite cutting edge.

'...The last confetti and advice were thrown,

And, as we moved, each face seemed to define   

Just what it saw departing: children frowned   

At something dull; fathers had never known

Success so huge and wholly farcical;

    The women shared

The secret like a happy funeral;

While girls, gripping their handbags tighter, stared   

At a religious wounding. Free at last,...'

Philip Larkin, The Whitsun Weddings

Weddings were often held on several summer Saturdays and as often was the way extended into a happy community event for all of us because the mums and sisters would come out of stairs 2, 4, 6 and 8 Oxgangs Avenue to watch and enjoy the proceedings and in particular liked to discuss the brides' dresses.

The fun for the kids would start when all the photographs had been taken and the formal black cars would begin to depart. Oh the excitement when the cars began to move slowly away - will they, or won't they?

Then the car window slowly winds down and the groom's hand emerges to the excitement of perhaps twenty kids waiting and as the car goes by the half crowns, florins and shillings flew out followed by an almighty scrum - pennies and more from heaven!

When the average pocket money might be around two shillings this was big money. I always felt the greatest largesse was shown by the fathers of the bride and groom, but we could be surprised at the amounts that came from the lesser cars too.

Susan Bain (Oxgangs Park) and Iain Logan wedding St John's Church Oxgangs 1977

And the same happened too up the hill at St John's Church and presumably St Mark's RC Church  further along the Avenue.

Were scatters only an Edinburgh tradition?

Did those who provided the scatter come ready prepared, because a lot of coins of the realm were scattered.

The Right Rev KM Carey laying the Foundation Stone for the new St Hilda's Episcopal Church

St John's has sadly gone to the increasingly great church graveyard in the sky, but St Mark's RC Church further along the Avenue looks in robust health.

And what of St Hilda's Church? 

The congregation first met in a cottage in Colinton and then moved to the existing hall in 1951. 

In 1966 a striking, state of the art Modernist building was opened; and yet less than half a century later the church was knocked down only a few years after the start of the 21st century. 

The coming and going of a church, indeed two churches within a few generations says something about Christianity and lends some weight to recording these vignettes before they disappear from life in Oxgangs.