This is one of several articles written by Louis Stott who generously offered local aspects of his scholarship to the archive of Loch Ard Local History Group–our thanks to Louis and his family for this material.

   Aberfoyle (Aberfoil) was once two villages separated by the River Forth.  Where the Main Street is today was actually the village of Craiguchty.  Aberfoyle was on the south side of the river where Manse Road now is.

 Both villages were troubled by the flooding of the Pow Burn.  Many crops and animals were lost each year. A huge rock, left most probably from The Ice Age, was the cause of the problem.  If the rock was not there the water would be able to flow within its banks except in extreme cases.

  he people of Aberfoyle decided they would have to blow up this rock as it was far too large to be removed by any other means.  \they collected together all the gunpowder they had in the village but it was not enough to do the job.  They came across the river and had a meeting with the people in Craiguchty as their crops were affected by the flooding too.  It was decided to collect all the gunpowder from Craiguchty and add it to that of Aberfoyle.

  A hole was chipped out of the rock and the gunpowder was inserted.  A fuse was prepared, ready just to light.  For some unknown reason the fuse was not lit immediately but left until the next day.  Un fortunately it rained heavily during the night and the gunpowder was soaked.  There was no more in either village or no money to buy any more so the rock remained and the flooding continued.

  The people from both villages had learnt a valuable lesson from this, not only the old saying of “Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today”, but more importantly that they could help each other in difficult times.  They came to rely on each other and gradually became one village.