Bank Avenue, Downfield, received its name, not from any “commercial bank,” but from the estate of Baldovan, which, in 1710, was known as “The Bank”.
The estate dates back to the early days of the seventeenth century, and it was at that date in the hands of the Scrymgeours, Viscounts of Dudhope.
A Fife family, the Nairns of Sandford – now St. Fort – gained control of Baldovan about 1680, and held the estate for 60 years. It was in 1710, while David Wedderburne of that family was in possession, that the estate of Baldovan received the designation of “The Bank”.
In 1740 Walter Tullidelph, upon whom the degree of LL.D. was conferred by the University of St. Andrews, returned to Scotland from Antigua, where he had amassed a large fortune. He was of an old Aberdeenshire family, and he purchased the estates of Baldovan and Balgay. Upon his two daughters, Charlotte and Mary, he conferred the estates of Baldovan and Balgay as “tochers” or marriage dowries. When Charlotte married Sir John Ogilivy, baronet of Inverquharity, in 1754, she obtained “The Bank”. n the marriage of his younger daughter, Mary, to the Hon. Alexander Leslie, son of the fifth Earl of Leven, she received, as her portion, the estate of Balgay.
It was proposed to rename “The Bank, Tullidelph Hall, but ultimately the old name survived.
From 1754 until the present day the estate of Baldovan has been in the hands of the Ogilvys, and at the present time the tenth baronet, Sir Herbert Kinnaird Ogilvy of Inverquharity, resides there.
Dr. Walter Tullidelph also owned the estate of Logie, and Tullideph Road takes its name from him.
Source: ‘The People’s Journal’, D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd.