PAPER-MAKING IN ABERDEEN AND DISTRICT 95 
INVERURIE Mrtts—THomas Tait & Sons, Ltp.—Inverurie Mills are 
situated on the river Don, about fourteen miles from Aberdeen, and 
were established in 1860 by Mr. Thomas ‘Tait, whose descendants to 
the fourth generation are still in control. 
They occupy a suitable position near the river, and not far from the 
intake of the former Aberdeenshire Canal. The canal was closed in 
1853 to make way for the railway which was opened in the following 
year, and the uppermost section of the disused waterway came in con- 
veniently as a medium for providing driving power to the new paper mill. 
The possibilities of esparto grass, grown in Spain and North Africa, 
came under the notice of paper-makers about this time, and this was 
doubtless one of the inducements to laying down the mill at Inverurie. 
At any rate, it was with esparto grass that the mill started off, being the 
first mill in the North to use it, and this has continued to be the material 
by which the mill has mainly stood. An interesting reminder of these 
early days is preserved at the works in the shape of a primitive boiler 
for treating the grass. 
When the mill started off the excise duty on paper was still operative 
(£14 14s. per ton), and it is of interest to observe in the works a 
document, dated April 23, 1860, licensing the firm to make paper, subject 
to the payment of the usual duty—a burden that was removed from the 
industry in the year following. 
In 1886 the firm laid down an additional machine to the one already 
in use, and installed a plant for manufacturing wood-pulp from the log 
by the sulphite process, and although this was an untried venture in the 
North, it continued to be highly successful. In 1910 this process was 
brought under the Chemical Acts, requiring the payment of special 
taxes, and it then became possible to bring in wood-pulp from abroad on 
a cheaper basis. Consequently this branch of the firm’s works had to 
be discontinued in 1915. 
As already indicated, the product of the mills is essentially finest esparto 
papers, specially those suitable for typewriting and duplicating. ‘The 
firm export a considerable proportion of this output. 
The Managing Director is Mr. Thomas Tait, assisted by his son, 
Mr. William Tait, C.A., and Mr. J. Leslie Tait is Secretary. 
DonsipE Mitts—DonsipE PapeR Company, LtTp.—Donside Mills 
occupy a position two miles up the river Don, approximately on the site 
of the early mill which, as already stated, was in existence in 1696. In 
1888 Mr. John Shand resumed paper-making by converting a meal mill 
for the manufacture of brown wrappings, and he was followed in 1893 
by Messrs. John Leng & Co., Dundee, who changed the name from 
Gordon’s Mills to its present designation. 
The Donside Company is thus the youngest member of the local 
group of paper mills, but in the past forty years it has amply justified 
its existence. For situation it is specially favoured, lying as it does on 
low ground by the river amid striking scenery. Near at hand are the 
cruives or dykes, below which, on the morning when the spring salmon 
fishing opens, hundreds of fish are caught by nets between midnight 
and dawn, while in the immediate foreground are two of the most noted 
