Green Letters, Studies in Ecocriticism Volume 19 Number 1 February 2015
Special Issue: Literature and Sustainability
containing an essay by Dr William Welstead, Baugh. pp75-88:
The role of culture in the sustainable use of a “cultural landscape”: a case study from the Hebridean machair
This article explores the interrelationship between landscapes and culture. Taking as its focus the distinctive machair landscapes of western Scotland and Ireland, this study argues that continuing concern for the sustainable use of this landscape is fostered by its celebration in poetry and song and that, in turn, this literary culture depends on traditional ways of farming this fragile landscape. The blown shell sands of the machair plains are rich in calcium carbonate which contributes to its fertility and to the biodiversity of its flora. This article reviews how the machair landscape has been praised in traditional songs and how contemporary poetry functions as a vehicle for the transmission of cultural knowledge and values. It also considers how machair has become an “index” for Scottish Gaelic culture.
Softback book “‘Prospects Are Improving’ The Story of Francis Simpson and family, Manitoba Pioneers” by Francis Simpson
Francis Simpson emigrated from Lancashire, England to Manitoba, Canada in 1882. He wrote his life story which was found and published by his descendants.
There are numerous references to the Lamont family of Tiree and a chapter on a visit to Tiree in 1905.
A notebook of competition results, two photo albums and a scrap book relating to the Tiree SWI handicraft competitions, dinners and excursions during 2010-2021.
Collection of items washed up on Tiree’s beaches for a mini exhibition titled ‘The Sea’s Harvest‘, held in An Iodhlann in 2022, including lids and labels from seafood companies in Norway and Ireland, fishbox packaging tape, plastic ice tea bottle from China, plastic fishing buoy from Spain, plastic Listerine bottle from Spain, plastic sea-sickness tablets container from Russia, wave-smoothed remnant of a Mortise-and-Tenon carpentry joint, plastic drinks cans holder.
Six folders and notebooks of Minutes, newsletters, bank statements and accounts pertaining to the Tiree Scottish Women’s Institute. These date from c2010 to 2021, when the organisation ceased to operate in Tiree.
Pewter quaich inscribed with the names of former Tiree Scottish Women’s Institute members, from 2000 to 2005. the names inscribed are: Mrs W. MacFadyen (2000), Mrs A. MacDonald (2001), Mrs A. MacKinnon (2002), Mrs A MacIntyre (2003), Mrs A. MacKinnon (2004), Mrs M. MacIntyre (2005).
Jennie Niven, the donor, was the final organiser for the last 15 year’s of the SWI’s organisational history in Tiree.
