Ordnance Survey map sheet LXV & LXXIX.
Map of the eastern areas of Tiree from Baugh in the south to the Ringing Stone in the north, at a scale of 6 inches to the mile (1:10,560).
1997.215.13
Leave a Reply
Tag Archives: ruaig
1997.214.13
Ordnance Survey map sheet LXV.6.
Map of the Ruaig/Brock area at a scale of 25 inches to the mile (1:2,500).
2002.152.1
Ordnance Survey aerial photograph of Ruaig.
Black and white aerial photograph of Ruaig taken on 13/5/1998. (Frame number: 030, film number: 98-561)
1997.191.3
Colour leaflet for the Hebridean Trust.
Leaflet for the Hebridean Trust with a colour aerial photograph of Hynish on the front and information about the Sandaig Museum, the Skerryvore Museum, Alan Stevenson House, Hynish Lower Square and Ruaig Church Museum.
1997.148.14
Corn stooks at Ruaig
Postcard of corn stooks at Ruaig in the mid-20th century.
This postcard shows a field of corn stooks at Ruaig in the mid-20th century. The corn was cut and bound into a ‘sguab’ (sheaf) using two handfuls pulled from the sheaf to make a ‘bann’ (tie). These were lined up into an ‘adag’, a short double row of eight to ten sheaves.
The old men were very particular to line up the row of ‘adagan’ in the field so that you could see ‘gobhal na h-adaig’ (the gap between the sheaves) from one end of the field to the other. If cut slightly unripe because of the weather, the sheaves were turned every day until they ripened.
Harvesting was hard, thirsty work and a tin of ‘sùgh min-choirce’ (cold well water mixed with oatmeal) was kept in the shade of an ‘adag’ to provide a refreshing drink.
Black and white postcard of Ruaig.
Ruaig with corn sheaves in the foreground and L-R Taigh Eoghainn Iain na Hongs (Ruaig Post Office in the 1930s) and Taigh Dhonnchaidh or Alasdair Dhonnchaidh (Ruaig Post Office in the 1970s).
1997.148.35
Black and white postcard of Ruaig School.
Ruaig School. (Original in Filing Cabinet 2 drawer 1: 1997.178)
1997.148.32
Black and white photograph of Ruaig School taken in 1935.
Ruaig School, 1935. L-R: (front) Hector MacArthur, Caoles; Donald MacArthur, Caoles; Rena MacKinnon, Vaul; Lillian Graham, Ruaig; Janet MacFadyen, Caoles; Jan MacKinnon, Ruaig; Hugh MacLean, Salum; Lachie MacLean, Salum; (back) Robert MacLeod, headmaster; Peter MacLeod, headmaster’s son; Morag MacFadyen, Caoles; Alasdair MacLean, Salum; Minnie MacKinnon, Vaul; Archie MacLean, Caoles; Mary Flora MacKinnon, Ruaig; Margaret Graham, Vaul; James Graham, Vaul; Isabel MacDonald, Milton; Hector MacKinnon, Vaul; Mary MacArthur, Caoles; Angus MacLean, Caoles; Jessie Ann MacFadyen (or Mary Bell MacFadyen), Caoles; Margaret MacLean, primary teacher.
1997.148.38
Black and white photograph of a group of people outside Ruaig School in 1921.
Building the extension to, or re-building, Ruaig School after the fire. In the back row are Calum MacKinnon, butcher in Scarinish (2nd left), Colin MacArthur, mason from Caoles (3rd right) and Sandy Mor MacLean from Sea View, Caoles (2nd right). 3rd from L (seated) may be Elizabeth Lamont (Lizzie Bhan).
1997.148.33
Lifting potatoes at Ruaig
Postcard of the potato harvest at Ruaig in the mid-1920s.
Courtesy of Mr Angus MacLean
Potatoes were first grown in the Hebrides in 1743 when they were brought back to South Uist from Ireland by MacDonald of Clanranald. His tenants were unwilling to plant them and brought the crop to his house as they refused to eat them.
However, by 1800 potatoes had become the main food crop in the islands, including Tiree. They produce three to five times as many calories as grain from the same area of land. Potatoes are also a much more dependable crop than oats and barley, which can be flattened overnight by a storm.
Dependable, that is, until 1846, when the fungus causing potato blight caused widespread starvation in Europe. It is said that West Hynish was the only area of Tiree to be unaffected. This postcard shows Nancy and Alexander MacInnes in the foreground harvesting potatoes in Ruaig in the mid-1920s.
Black and white photograph of potato lifting at Ruaig.
Lifting potatoes at Ruaig, c. 1925-6, with Nancy and Alexander MacInnes in the foreground (Duncan MacInnes`s aunt and great-uncle).
1997.144.2
Photocopied Scottish Education Department Merit Certificate dated 1895 for Danina MacKinnon, Ruaig.
Merit Certificate for Danina MacKinnon, Ruaig, dated August 1895 declaring her to have shown a thorough efficiency in Reading, Writing and Arithmetic and in English, Geography, History, Domestic Economy and Gaelic.