Trump visits mom's birthplace in Scotland

STORNOWAY, Scotland, June 10 (UPI) -- U.S. developer Donald Trump, on a trip to Scotland to lobby for his proposed golf resort, stopped off at the island cottage where his mother grew up.

Trump's private jet dwarfed everything else on the runway at Stornoway Airport on the Isle of Lewis, The Scotsman reported. Trump, his sister, Maryanne Trump Barry, a federal appeals judge, and a retinue of security guards and PR people traveled to the cottage Monday in a four-car convoy.

Mary Macleod was born on Lewis in 1912, the daughter of a crofter. In 1936, she married Fred Trump, who later became one of New York's foremost developers, in New York City.

The cottage where the Macleods lived in the hamlet of Tong 4 miles from Stornoway is still occupied by two cousins, Willie and Alastair Murray.

"It was a bit of a scrum, right enough, but he was terrific and he enjoyed the trip to Tong," Willie Murray said of the visit.

Trump denied that his side trip to Lewis was a publicity stunt in aid of his plans for the east coast of Scotland. He said his $2 billion project is a chance to do "something historic" for the country where his mother was born.