School Story Competition

Today we are launching a new competition for all Inverclyde Primary Schools. 

We believe passionately in the use of local heritage to create a sense of civic pride, and we know schools in our area work hard to promote citizenship and an understanding of local history. We hope this competition will provide an opportunity to build on that good work.

What we would like is for local school pupils in P6 or P7 to tell us a story set in our home town, using some of the spooky history of the area. It’s something you could do as a Halloween activity, or as part of Tell A Story Day on October 24^th. 

The story can be told in any form, poetry, comic strip, fairytale, whatever suits the story best. It should take up no more than 2 sides of A4 paper including illustrations. 

The winning entry from each school will be included in a special digital “scary story book” which will be online later in the year. The school which sends us the best selection of scary stories will win £50 to spend on new books for the school. The writer of the best scary story will win a £20 book token and their story will also be adapted into a comic strip. Every school that enters will receive a copy of our original book of local folktales “Tales of the Oak”.

We have already written out to all local schools to invite them to get involved, suggesting a few areas they may like to use for inspiration, we've included them below. But you don't have to choose those, there are many more stories on this blog or that you may have heard elsewhere to use for inspiration...

The closing date for the competition is Friday 16 November, if you have any questions at all, you can contact us on aulddunrod@gmail.com. We look forward to being terrified by your stories.


Malkie and the Bogle - A Port Glasgow tale....

The Ballad of Auld Dunrod - Concerning the Warlock of Inverkip who terrorised the area




The Legend of the Gourock Monster

From the archive - Mortonosaurus vs Godzilla

Came across this last month, I figured as we were celebrating a local monster this month, I'd share it.

The letter really only gives a flavour of the whole "high concept" proposal...which was basically that Godzilla would attack Greenock and that our hometown hero and team mascot Mortonosaurus would have fought him across the town, eventually pitching him into the river where he would have been finished off by a sea serpent. Boof.

I like to think it would have turned out a bit like the Beatie Boys "intergalactic" video.

Sadly...despite this declaration of support (or at least, not total derision) from Morton, we never got this past the script stage. Shame.

Seventy Years of The Gourock Monster



This is not a picture of the Gourock Monster carcass,
but monster experts agree it may have looked slightly similar
Cryptomundo

June 2012 is the 70th Anniversary of the mysterious Gourock Monster washing up at Cardwell Bay, as detailed in our post "Massive Sea Monster Terrorises Gourock" and our only sort of kidding April Fool "Time For A Serpent Sculpture".

The possibility of the Clyde being home to a sea creature, was a major feature of our original book Tales of the Oak, and sure enough, could tie together centuries of potential river and serpent worship along the banks of the Clyde (though how the serpent got along with the Port Glasgow Mermaid remains a source of some debate).

I still live in hope that Gourock will eventually base some sort of community festival round this event...It could be called "Serpentfest" or "Monster Mania".

Anyhow, we've a few wee related items over the month, but for those of you who have missed it previously, or not found the time in your life to search it out on youtube, here again is the classic clip from Arthur C Clarkes Mysterious World which deals with "The Gourock Monster".





The legend of the Gourock Monster also appears in a childrens book I've written, The Superpower Project...

With the help of a wisecracking, steampunk robot, two accidental superheroes discover that they have inherited some amazing, if unusual, abilities. Computer whiz Megan can fly (mostly sleep-flying, but she's working on it) while her best friend Cam can (in theory) transform into any animal, but mostly ends up as a were-hamster.

Together they must protect the source of their ancestral powers from a wannabe evil mastermind and his gang of industrial transformer robots who've disguised themselves as modern art installations on their Greenock estate.

It isn't easy to balance school and epic super-battles, not to mention finding time to search for other super-talents and train with their Mr Miyagi-esque were-tiger coach.Can Megan and Cam beat the bad guy, defeat his robot transformers and become the superheroes they were born to be?

The Superpower Project is available from Floris Books / Kelpies.