Over the years legacies have played a really important role in the APRS story. We are grateful to be among the beneficiaries of Margaret Hunter’s legacy, which has given us the financial security to confirm Nikki in post to the end of May 2026 and re-recruit for Nina’s post when she retires.
Margaret Hunter (née Flynn) and her husband Tom were both Life Members of APRS (Tom since 1996, Margaret since 2005). They donated to various campaigns over the years as well as attending APRS events.
The Hunters were both passionate about the outdoors, and keen walkers. They joined the Glasgow Group of the Holiday Fellowship after WW2, a walking and climbing organisation that hired buses and took railway employees for walks and climbs across Scotland.
The Scotsman reports that it was on a walk that Margaret and Tom took soon after the Second World War, on Ben Lomond, that the concept of the West Highland Way started to form. They looked across Loch Lomond to an area earmarked for development and wondered how to protect some of Scotland’s most special places. It was after Margaret and Tom returned to Glasgow and, after discussion with friends, the West Highland Way was born.
Tom convened a sub-committee with representatives from other Glasgow walking groups, and in 1969 they surveyed the route. Finally Tom wrote A Guide to the West Highland Way which was published in 1979. Tom died in 2016 and Margaret in late 2024.
Margaret, who was a passionate walker, met Tom at a dance for railway workers in 1949 and, together they found a boost to their social life in the Holiday Fellowship, a volunteer organisation for railway employees who would hire a bus and travel for walks and climbs as far away as Braemar.
Tom acknowledged the important role Margaret played in creating his Guide to the West Highland Way with this tongue-in-cheek comment in the forward of the book:
“I wish to thank my wife for assistance in the field, for checking the manuscript and for her constant criticism which, although annoying, was very necessary.”
The Herald, in their obituary of Tom Hunter said: “He would have hated to be known as a Munro Bagger but together he and [Margaret Hunter], his wife climbed 287 mountains, some several times, because they liked them.”
Margaret died on 17th October 2024 at the age of 96.