New app bring’s Fife town’s history to life

A series of trails around the area will help be aided by the app, which comes after a £42,100 grant from the national lottery.

The app, which is being unveiled by Kinghorn Historical Society tomorrow (Friday) combines virtual reality images, audio stories from the town, original research and images, plus a trail map.

It features a menu of over 30 locations, an interactive map with location markers, a children’s quiz, and even 360 degree images of key locations, where part of the picture is replaced with archival images.

There will also be audio extracts from the oral history interviews, in which people speak about their experiences of Kinghorn in the past.

The app encourages users to explore Kinghorn and see how each area used to look, and how people lived in years gone by.

Ginny Reid, of Kinghorn Historical Society, said: “he app has two indexes, one is a location page and the other is an interactive map where you can click on the locations.

“That takes you through to individual pages for various sites in Kinghorn. There are just over 30 of them.

“You can then access text which gives you the history, various images, and some archival 360 degree images.

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“You can stand at the site, click your phone, and see how it used to look.

“There are a few virtual reality images as well, and we also have some audio clips from our oral history, telling stories of what they remember, from perhaps the 1930s when they went to school, or some wartime memories.

“We’re very excited about it, and the app developer has been terrific.

“We’re also doing leaflets for those who don’t have smartphones.”

“If we don’t bring history alive in this way generations are going to forget what it was like.

“Just talking to some of the children at the school they had no idea about some of the things that had gone on previously – the regeneration of the High Street in the 1960s destroyed huge swathes of Kinghorn.

“So just to bring some of that old Kinghorn back and let people know what it was like.”

Interpretation boards at a variety of locations are also planned.

An exhibition; Kinghorn Old and New will open on September 7 in Kinghorn Station Gallery and will be open every Saturday and Sunday during September.

The historical society are using the opening of the exhibition to launch the trail.

The app, available on Apple and Android, can be downloaded for free.

The leaflets are available from the community centre.