Obituary - Jean Smith, businesswoman and athlete who helped save East Kilbride railway line from the Beeching cuts

Died: December 2, 2017

JEAN Smith, who has died of cancer aged 73, was a businesswoman and athlete who excelled in a range of sports including hockey, golf, tennis and badminton. She also ran a successful catering business and was a leading figure in the campaign to save the Glasgow to East Kilbride railway line from the infamous Beeching cuts.

Born and brought up in Motherwell, close to the football stadium, she learned to swim at Motherwell Baths whose Amateur Swimming and Water Polo Club dominated swimming in Scotland in the 1940s and 50s under David Crabb and Nancy Riach.

In the choral and musical traditions of Lanarkshire, especially in the hometown of Sir Alexander Gibson, she learned piano and became a mezzo soprano, but hid that light under a bushel. An only child she learned many skills from her relatives and was an accomplished car mechanic, electrician, plumber, painter, decorator, dressmaker and tailoress. To this she later added the creation of jewellery, with gemstones from around the world, selling at craft fairs over many seasons. She often said that if education for girls in her day had been different she would have chosen a career in engineering.

While at primary school, summer holidays were usually to Arran where one of the group of adults was Jack McLean, the golf professional at Gleneagles. He wanted a holiday free from the angst of adult golfers and instead took all the youngsters on to Lamlash Golf Course each day to let them enjoy the game, with coaching by him.

When her parents moved to Clarkston Jean attended Eastwood Senior Secondary School and met Graeme, her future husband, who was in the year below Jean. She was accepted for entry to Dunfermline Physical College of Education, which was then in Aberdeen, and would have been an excellent coach in all sports, but having had an induction there to a school class of 30 pupils and more importantly being 150 miles north of Glasgow she promptly changed to a business career. Her parents were rather put out.

In business, she became the wine and spirit buyer for Lowlands of Scotland Hotels in Glasgow; they then moved headquarters to East Kilbride where the company built and opened the Bruce Hotel and its international Cabaret Room, adding to its existing 12 hotels.

After her children were all well on in school, Jean successfully formed her own catering business. Later she refreshed her secretarial skills and absorbed the new world of computer programming and applications. She was appointed secretary to one of the directors of the Weir Group in Cathcart. Everyone knew if they wanted something done of importance and urgency the person to seek out was Jean Smith.

At the Festive Season, hampers arrived at the family home from exotic places. One Middle East agent, esteemed and wealthy, insisted on inviting her to become his personal business secretary in Egypt. The idea of a yacht and a company car was good, but she was not certain if she would then become wife number three or four - she declined.

Jean constantly supported her husband in his various civic projects and in his career in new towns and in economic development, most significantly the Scottish Development Agency. Like him, she was active in the New Glasgow Society, and in forming the Glasgow-East Kilbride Railway Development Association which successfully campaigned against the Beeching plans to close the line down, with the result that, today, the East Kilbride railway is open, and flourishing. In later years she joined the Friends of Glasgow University Library.

For relaxation, apart from having five children, Jean resumed golf and joined Bonnyton Golf Club in Eaglesham, playing for the ladies team in Scotland and England, and becoming the ladies' captain. For her, trophies meant a lot but playing the game with friends and colleagues meant more.

She also became a member of the Renfrewshire Ladies County Golf Association with competitive golfing on umpteen courses. Sport and relaxation happily went together.

Her business skills and knowledge of golf were appreciated by all clubs and she was appointed membership secretary of the association, always encouraging new members to come forward.

On joining Cathcart Castle Golf Club, the fact Jean knew how to play high up on the moors, plus snow and winds, of Eaglesham added a special factor to her prowess on the lower slopes of Clarkston. She became a stalwart of the club team in the Greenlees League and playing throughout the West of Scotland was a delight. She soon became a committee member, but declined the captaincy offered. She said no sane parson, already having been a captain, would be go near a second term. Instead she focussed on the core of the game and for many years was the ladies handicap secretary, highly supportive of all members and skilled in the principles and rules of golf. The system was computerised with no hiccup and made much easier to understand.

Jean Smith is survived by her husband, Graeme, five children Fiona, Gordon, Sandy, Cameron and Crawford, and five grandchildren.

LG SMITH