John Gray Centre

03/06/2026

📣LOCAL HISTORY CENTRE 50TH ANNIVERSARY EVENT
✨LH50 Celebrations continue with a special workshop with the Scottish Women's Institute (SWI) .
✨As many will know, the Scottish Women's Institute, historically known as the Rural, was founded in 1917, at Longniddry, by Mrs Catherine Blair, suffragist and member of the Women Social and Political Union (WSPU) during WW1.
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✨To mark LH50 and to celebrate the role that the Scottish Women's Institute plays in women's history in general, and East Lothian's history more specifically, the SWI East Lothian Federation members will be facilitating a flower arrangement and decoupage workshop for members and non-members.
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✨THIS WORKSHOP IS OPEN TO A MAXIMUM OF 10 NON-MEMBERS.
Date: 22nd June 2026 (Monday)
Time: 5.30 to 6.30pm
Venue: Star Room, John Gray Centre
✨THIS EVENT IS FREE-OF-CHARGE. MATERIALS WILL BE PROVIDED.
If you are interested in getting creative or wish to learn something new:
Email: [email protected] or
Tel: 01620 820680 TO BOOK A PLACE.

02/06/2026

💡Local History Centre 50th Anniversary Newspaper Spotlight:
📰Courier front page this week 50 years ago featured the clean-up process on Haddington High Street after the town's first open market.✨

29/05/2026

Look at this gorgeous memory board!

If you have memories of The Brunton that you would like to share - be it attending the panto, giving blood, working there or whatever - get yourself along and pin them up on the board.

If you can't make it along in person, the Archive service are collecting memories as part of the project too. Check out https://www.johngraycentre.org/celebrating-the-brunton/ to see how you can contribute and watch out for our upcoming event & film showcasing those treasured memories already submitted

To celebrate the 55th anniversary of Brunton Hall, we are inviting EVERYONE to share their favourite memories. These stories will help create a lasting legacy, shaping the spirit and story of a brand new building for the future.

To make sure these memories don’t get lost, we have teamed up with East Lothian Council Arts Service to create The Brunton Encore - a fun memory board designed to look like a theatre stage. We are also working with John Gray Centre's Archive service to collect and record images, memories and memorabilia.

So if you have a Brunton memory to add then share it with us using or visit the Brunton foyer within office hours! ✨

26/05/2026

💡Local History Centre 50th Anniversary Newspaper Spotlight:
📰Courier front page this week 50 years ago featured the presentation of the Division III Championship Shield to Haddington R.F.C.✨

25/05/2026

📣LOCAL HISTORY EVENT REMINDER📣:
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⭐️THE HISTORY & ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE TRANENT-COCKENZIE WAGGONWAY
Date: 1st June 2026 (Monday)
Time: 5.30 to 6.30pm
Venue: Star Room, John Gray Centre
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✨THERE ARE STILL PLACES AVAILABLE - HURRY AND MAKE YOUR BOOKING!
Email: [email protected] OR telephone: 01620 820680
Join us for this enlightening community event!

21/05/2026

Screaming Man 1963 by John Bellany, HRSA (1942-2013, oil on canvas.

This painting is part of our current exhibition, John Bellany, HRSA. It was painted when Bellany was a Third-Year student at Edinburgh College of Art, He may have been inspired by Courbet’s self-portrait (The Desperate Man) which he became acquainted with during a visit to Paris in the Spring of 1963.

A similar self-portrait drawing by Bellany from 1963 was exhibited in ‘A Life in Self Portraiture’ at the City Art Centre, Edinburgh in 2025.

The exhibition is part of RSA200: Celebrating Together a partnership project bringing together hundreds of artists, partners, galleries and institutions to mark the bicentenary of the Royal Scottish Academy in 2026. Find out more: royalscottishacademy.org.

John Bellany HRSA opened Friday 17th April and runs to to Saturday 19th September. The museum is open Thursday and Friday from 10am to 1pm and 2pm to 5pm, and Saturday from 10am to 1pm and 1.30pm to 4pm.

19/05/2026

💡Local History Centre 50th Anniversary Newspaper Spotlight:
📰Courier front page this week 50 years ago featured the discovery of a tern's egg in the then-proposed John Muir Country Park.✨

14/05/2026

These sketchbook drawings are on show in the museum temporary gallery and are are part of the current exhibition, John Bellany, HRSA.

From his student years onwards, Bellany always had a sketch book by his side. They were crucial to his visual thinking and would be used for various purposes…..responding to new environments and landscapes, working out compositional ideas with copious notes on dimensions and colour arrangements, writings about paintings he had seen and admired, thoughts on his own work and drafts of letters he was about to send and speeches he had been invited to deliver. We can see in the sketch books how Bellany’s imaginative freedom was hard won. The meticulous preparation undergone in order to achieve the fluency of expression he desired when painting is fully revealed. Constructing a painting was a complex task and demanded numerous preparatory studies before proceeding onto the canvas. Alexander Moffat collection

The exhibition is part of RSA200: Celebrating Together a partnership project bringing together hundreds of artists, partners, galleries and institutions to mark the bicentenary of the Royal Scottish Academy in 2026. Find out more: royalscottishacademy.org.

John Bellany HRSA opened Friday 17th April and runs to to Saturday 19th September. The museum is open Thursday and Friday from 10am to 1pm and 2pm to 5pm, and Saturday from 10am to 1pm and 1.30pm to 4pm.

13/05/2026

📣LOCAL HISTORY EVENT ALERT!📣
The Local History Centre's 50th Anniversary Celebration continues with
"THE HISTORY & ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE TRANENT-COCKENZIE WAGGONWAY".
Date: 1st June 2026 (Monday)
Time: 5.30 to 6.30pm
Venue: Star Room, John Gray Centre
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✨We are fortunate to have the Chair of the amazing 1722 Waggonway Group, Ed Bethune, who is an early railways historian, give a presentation on the group's latest archaeological findings and what this reveals about the beginnings of railways in Scotland.✨
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PLACES ARE LIMITED SO BOOKING IS COMPULSORY.
Email: [email protected] OR telephone: 01620 820680
Join us for this enlightening community event!🎉

12/05/2026

Local History Centre 50th Anniversary Newspaper Spotlight:
📰Courier front page this week 50 years ago featured an event relating to the restoration of Lady Kitty's Doo'cot in .