National Museum of Rural Life
National Museums Scotland and partners have developed the National Museum of Rural Life, previously known as the Museum of Scottish Country Life, which is based at Wester Kittochside farm, lying between the town of East Kilbride in South Lanarkshire and the village of Carmunnock in Glasgow.
The project, opened in 2001, cost more than £9 million and was made possible through a partnership between the National Museums of Scotland, the National Trust for Scotland, the Heritage Lottery Fund, the European Regional Development Fund, South Lanarkshire Council, Scottish Natural Heritage and a number of private funders.
The National Museum of Rural Life has greatly extended the work of the former Scottish Agricultural Museum, founded in 1949, latterly located within the Royal Highland Showground at Ingliston, west of Edinburgh.
The completed National Museum of Rural Life features a 50,000-square-foot (4,600 m2) museum and visitor centre, the Georgian buildings of Wester Kittochside farm, the species-rich fields and hedgerows around it and a 24 ha (60 acre) events area.
The 44 ha (110 acre) farm was gifted in 1992 to the National Trust for Scotland by Mrs. Margaret Reid who had run the farm for many years with her late husband James, the last of ten generations of Reids. The Reids, as Lairds of Kittochside, farmed the property over a period of 400 years from 1567 to 1992.
Originally, John Reid, previously the tenant, had purchased the lands of Kittochside in 1567 from the Robert Muir, Laird of Caldwell. Muir tried to take back the lands by force and after burning down Kittochside the case came to be adjudicated at the Privy Council of James VI in 1600, the result being that Robert Muir was jailed for six months but was released after paying a fine of 500 merks to John Reid with a promise of 1015 merks on 11 November 1600 and then the Reids were free to develop the farm buildings and lands.
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Wikipedia