Old Travel Blog Photograph Loading Reeds Newburgh Fife Scotland

Old travel Blog photograph of a man loading Reeds from Mugdrum Island in the River Tay, offshore from the town of Newburgh, Fife, Scotland. Mugdrum's name is from muc-dhruim, the Scottish Gaelic for hog back. However, this was applied to the coast opposite in Perthshire, which part it was named for. The reeds on the island were once harvested for thatching houses and cottages and for protecting potatoes during transshipment. Until 1926, a 50 acre farm grew cereals, potatoes and turnips in the island's alluvial soil. It is now a nature reserve under the stewardship of the Tay Valley Wildfowlers' Association.



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Old Travel Blog Photograph Road From Ullapool To Lochinver Scotland

Old travel Blog photograph of the road from Ullapool, below Stac Pollaidh mountain, to Lochinver, Sutherland, Scotland. Stac Pollaidh is a mountain in the Northwest Highlands. The peak displays a rocky crest of Torridonian sandstone, with many pinnacles and steep gullies. The ridge was exposed to weathering as a nunatak above the ice sheet during the last Ice Age, while the ice flow carved and scoured the smooth sides of the mountain. The modern Gaelic name is a recent invention. The peak is named on the first edition Ordnance Survey maps simply as " An Stac ", the pinnacle, and on later maps as " Stac Polly ". The " Polly " element is of Norse origin, derived from " Pollå " meaning " pool river ".



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Old Travel Blog Photograph Mary Street Shieldaig Scotland

Old travel Blog photograph of cottages by the beach on Mary Street in Shieldaig, Wester Ross, Highlands, Scotland. This Scottish Highlands village was founded in 1800 with a view to training up seamen for war against Napoleon. After his, initial, defeat and exile to Elba, the community found itself a new role as a fishing village. Shieldaig did not escape the effects of the Highland Clearances. The village was part of the vast Applecross Estate and the community’s problems began when the estate changed hands from the MacKenzies of Applecross to the Duke of Leeds, whose wife was one of the family who had been responsible for the cruel Sutherland Clearances. The Duchess entrusted local matters to her gamekeeper, who, it soon became obvious, preferred sheep herds and sheep to mariners and sailors. Shieldaig fared badly in the next 30 years.



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Old Travel Blog Photograph Outer Court College Glasgow Scotland

Old travel Blog photograph of the Outer Court of the old College in Glasgow, Scotland. Glasgow University is the second oldest University in Scotland, second to St. Andrews in Fife, and was inaugurated in 1451 at the request of William Turnbull, Bishop of Glasgow. On his instigation, King James II applied to Pope Nicholas V who issued a Papal Bull, and in doing so gave Glasgow the opportunity to create a Studium Generale which would possess all of the powers of a University. Initially lectures were held in the Chapter House of Glasgow Cathedral, until 1457 when building started on the High Street. It was in 1460 that James Lord Hamilton donated to the Faculty of Arts an area of land on the east side on the High Street, and in 1560 a further endowment of money and land was given by Mary Queen of Scots. The University remained at this site until the 17th century, when new building works began in the area directly behind the High Street, and eventually grew to replace the original building on the High Street.



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Old Travel Blog Photograph John Ferguson Largs Scotland

Old travel Blog photograph of John Ferguson from Largs in Ayrshire, Scotland. The Ferguson surname is of Old Gaelic origin, found in Ireland and Scotland, and is a patronymic form of " Fergus ", from an Old Gaelic personal name " Fearghus ", composed of the elements " fear ", man, and " gus ", vigour, force, with the patronymic ending " son ". This Gaelic personal name was the name of an early Irish mythological figure, a valiant warrior, and was also the name of the grandfather of St. Columba. Ferguson is by far the most popular and widespread form of Fergus. Some Irish bearers of the name Fergus claim descent from Fergus, Prince of Galloway who died in 1161. Ferguson is widespread in Ireland in Ulster, where it is of Scottish descent. The surname is first recorded in Scotland in the mid 15th Century where the Fergusons are classed among the septs of Mar and Atholl.



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