Fossil returns to its roots after Fife pupils’ campaign

An ancient fossil has returned to its roots.

The Townhill fossil has been in Dunfermline’s Pittencrieff Park for many years but after youngsters lobbied of Fife Council, it has been relocated and is to take up home in Townhill Mining Heritage Garden, currently being created.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, as the Townhill pits became deeper, fossils of the extinct calamite and lepidodendron trees were revealed.

The trees lived in the Carboniferous period, the lepidodendron grew up to 130 feet.

In an extract from Townhill Primary School Log Book from June 17 1901: “Received from Manager (Underground) Townhill Colliery a section of a fossil tree, a lepidodendron, which was found in No 6 pit in workings 16 fathoms down from the surface and to the north of the pit bottom. It weighed about 10 cwts and measured 80 inches in circumference.”

Last year Townhill Primary School pupils found their fossil was in Pittencrieff Park and wrote to Fife Council to request that it be returned to Townhill for installation in the garden.

Picture by David Wardle