IMAGES taken in the 1960s by a photographer dubbed “the father of modern Scottish photography” are to feature in an exhibition marking Dunfermline’s newly-acquired city status.

Some 47 black and white pictures snapped by Joseph McKenzie, who trained as a photographer while in the RAF, will go on show at Dunfermline Carnegie Library and Galleries next month.

All the photos in the exhibition, titled Dunfermline And Its People, shown originally in the nearby Pittencrieff House Museum in 1968, were taken during 1967 and ’68 – an eventful period for the former Royal Burgh.

In 1967, Dunfermline’s 100-year-old Castleblair Works, built to weave linen before becoming a silk mill, closed and was a sign of the then town’s move away from textiles production.

To the south of Dunfermline, an estimated 1,000 families were settling into the recently-completed Pitcorthie housing estate, a key part of the town’s expansion following the opening of the Forth Road Bridge in October 1964.

In 1968, Dunfermline Athletic returned from Hampden Park after securing victory in the Scottish Cup final and a young upcoming folk singer, Barbara Dickson, took the plunge to become a professional musician.

Alice Pearson, a curator with the cultural charity OnFife, which runs the exhibition venue, said: “Joseph McKenzie really brings the city to life in his photographs – its history, its location, its hustle and bustle, as well as the friendliness of its people.

“He gave us a remarkable portrait of a place in the midst of momentous change and provides glimpses of a world that has all but vanished. It is fitting that his legacy can be enjoyed by people once again as Dunfermline begins a new chapter in its illustrious story.”

Dunfermline is one of eight places to have won city status through a competition as part of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations and the King conferred city status on the town after carrying out his first official visit as monarch earlier this month.

McKenzie, who died in 2015, aged 86, became a prolific photographer through the 1960s, documenting post-war Scotland at a time of momentous change.

After serving as a photographer in the RAF, McKenzie taught photography full-time at St Martin's School of Art in London and then at the Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee.

He was elected as an Associate of the Royal Photographic Society in 1954.