WE TAKE a look at the stories making headlines in East Lothian 25, 50 and 100 years ago.

25 years ago

AMBITIOUS plans for a nightclub in Musselburgh made the front page of the East Lothian Courier on May 14, 1999.

Musselburgh’s nightlife is set to explode if proposals to build a new leisure complex at Newhailes Park gets the go ahead.

The project is planned as a nightclub at weekends – but during the week it will be open for community use.

The plans were outlined at a Musselburgh Community Council meeting by Mr Alfredo Alongi, who lives locally, and represents the company behind the proposal.

Mr Alongi said that the intention was to create a real place of entertainment.

“We aim to put it among the top five nightclubs in Scotland, and we are sure that East Lothian will benefit,” he said.

Though plans were still at a very early stage, it was intended that the club, the interior of which will be designed by Glasgow agency Graven Images, currently involved in designing the interior of the Millennium Dome, would open in December 1999, with a capacity for 1,000 people.

50 years ago

“BAD tenants” were terrorising others on a street in Tranent, reported the East Lothian Courier on May 16, 1974.

Tenants in the Robertson Avenue area of Tranent are being terrorised by the families of a few bad tenants.

A councillor claimed this week that tyres were being slashed, greenhouses smashed and flowers ripped out of gardens.

And he said that one lady had her house ‘bombarded’ with bricks and other things when she left her front door open.

Bailie Renton told Tranent Town Council that he had been approached by one tenant who was attending the doctor as a result of nervous tension.

“There are bad tenants living in there,” he said. “I realise the police are trying their best but the offenders are difficult to catch.”

The youngsters concerned were not being looked after by their parents and things were so bad that one couple had actually thought of splitting up and going to their respective mothers until another house could be found away from Tranent.

100 years ago

A FIRE at a farm steading in a small East Lothian hamlet was making headlines in The Haddingtonshire Courier on May 16, 1924.

Fire broke out, early on Monday morning, at the farm steading of Bankrugg, Bolton, tenanted by Mr Andrew Lawnity of the granary, and spread to the straw barn, engine house, and some of the castle courts.

Haddington fire brigade made a quick response, and fortunately, sufficient water was obtained from three wells to cope with the conflagration.

Before being subdued, however, considerable damage had been caused to the steading.