Gretna, Manitoba Gretna after Gretna Green in Scotland, also a border community, where runaway couples were married by the blacksmith at his anvil. Gretna soon became a prominent border community. As businesses thrived and expanded, Gretna life in the early 20th century was filled with promise and opportunity. As progress would have it, changes afforded Gretna no favours and the community began losing the grain milling industry responsible for its boom. After the World War II, Gretna became the centre for oil transfer to the United States of America. Enbridge Pipelines Inc. (the main storage and transfer company of oil in southern
HM Factory, Gretna HM Factory, Gretna H.M. Factory, Gretna was the United Kingdom's largest Cordite factory in World War I. The government-owned facility was adjacent to the Solway Firth, near Gretna, Dumfries and Galloway. It was built by the Ministry of Munitions in response to the Shell Crisis of 1915. The Devil's Porridge Museum, Eastriggs, Dumfriesshire, commemorates the efforts of these workers during the First World War. H.M. Factory, Gretna stretched from Mossband near Longtown in the east, to Dornock / Eastriggs in the west straddling the Scottish / English border. The facility consisted of four large production sites and two purpose-built townships.