TOBAR AN DUALCHAIS: Memories of Glendale, Nova Scotia in 1963

Glebe House, Glendale Pic Craig Ford/Flickr

Dr John Shaw is one of the worlds’ foremost scholars of Gaelic oral traditions and is an Honorary Fellow in Celtic and Scottish Studies at Edinburgh University.

Following encouragement from John Lorne Campbell during his visit to Canna in 1961, John went on to conduct extensive fieldwork research into Nova Scotia’s rich Gaelic culture.

Here he recalls his first summer in Glendale, Nova Scotia…


Glendale is a small rural community in Inverness County, Cape Breton Island, about a dozen miles inland from the Strait of Canso – the body of water that separates Cape Breton from the Nova Scotia mainland – and extending along the Trans-Canada highway.

During the first half of the 19th century, it was settled by Gaels forced by the clearances to leave their homes and relatives in Uist, Morar, Moidart and adjoining areas.

Predominantly Roman Catholic, it has been a self-reliant community, never rich, where families lived by subsistence farming and woods work, taking employment (when available) with local industries or ‘working away’.

For generations people were left to their own devices for entertainment, allowing the wealth of Gaelic tradition brought with them to thrive and develop.

Dr John Shaw

Toward the end of June 1963, I found myself standing with my suitcase in the driveway beside the Glebe house in Glendale, having arrived that day from the Boston area at the suggestion of John Lorne Campbell of Canna who had mentioned in passing that Nova Scotia was the home of a still vigorous Gaelic community, and an ideal place for the Gaelic learner.

At that time the parish consisted of about 100 families, most of them Gaelic speaking. Surrounding were areas of mixed forest, some stretching uninterrupted for miles until the next settlement.

Although I had been raised in rural North America, I had never seen a place like it before.

The arrangement was for me to stay in the Glebe house with Father John Angus Rankin, the Gaelic speaking parish priest, and to work for room and board on the Glebe farm.

During the day, there was rarely an idle moment; no modern farm equipment on the place, and we used a team of horses for the heavy work of hauling anything such as bringing in the endless loads of hay to be pitched and spread by hand into the hayloft.

Keeping house for Father John was his mother Sarah (‘Sarah John Y’) and her brother Alec Beaton, both of whom proved to be valuable sources of local folklore – much of it originating in Lochaber – along with a memorable stream of cheerful, humorous repartee.

Within the first few days, I started walking the back roads with my small reel-to-reel battery tape recorder making house visits.

Cape Breton

People were not only friendly, but having never before encountered someone above infancy learning the language, unfailingly patient with my efforts.

The annual Glendale Parish Concert, held in early July, was the most keenly anticipated Gaelic cultural event of that part of Inverness County.

To summarise an earlier description: “The elaborate preparations by the men of the parish began up to a week before the event and involved everything from fencing to the building of a raised stage and the constant monitoring of weather reports over the local radio station.

“The reason became apparent when the day arrived and the cars and pickup trucks – in their hundreds and overflowing with relatives, neighbours and friends – converged on the farm, filling the enormous hayfields cleared early for the occasion, and eventually lining both sides of the Trans-Canada.

“From the moment the concert began the excitement was palpable: a festive atmosphere surrounding an annual event where kinship groups were reunited, friendships renewed, news exchanged, all underlain by the serious business of celebrating the song, music and dance central to the life of the region.”

No less powerful from the visitor’s point of view, at least, was the experience of Highland culture from the 18th century performed with a natural competence and vigour which, even with the benefits of a PA system and floodlights, had little if any relation to the modern concert stages of North America or Europe. Following the practice from the western Highlands, performing singers held hands as they sang together.

Performers were neatly – almost formally – dressed, yet in their manner they were unassuming, often appearing shy when introduced on stage.

The audience, however, knew what to expect.

Whenever a fiddler made particularly skilful work of the transition from Strathspey to reel the listeners, many of whom knew the tunes and were following the playing intently, responded with a spontaneous swell of applause.

During the Gaelic songs people in the audience joined in the chorus with gusto.

Most, though not all, of the Gaelic singers were men, usually in groups of four or five, with a leader singing the verses and the rest taking up the refrain.

Two song performances were particularly memorable.

The first, concerning a drowning at sea and delivered in a powerful traditional style, was sung by Roddy MacInnis (‘Rodaidh Ailig Ruairidh’) from the parish; toward the end of the evening a group from Broad Cove on the western shore of the county were announced, launching almost casually into rendition of Air faill ill ó ro, faill ill ó, an old sailing song known on both sides of the Atlantic.

The leader, a trim man in his 50s by the name of Lauchie MacLellan, sang the verses with an ease and authority that commanded and held the listeners’ attention, appearing to be totally absorbed in the song and unaware of the of the audience.

During the 1970s and 80s both men became close friends and important sources of songs.

Father John, together with his Rankin and Beaton relatives, was himself a keen and active proponent of Gaelic tradition, and his residence had become a destination for the island’s most distinguished Scottish fiddle players, including Bill Lamey and the composer of tunes Dan Rory MacDonald.

Their style was distinctive, recalling the pipes, and far removed from the classical technique of mainstream players elsewhere.

Many of the tunes were referred to by their Gaelic names: Bog a’ Lochain, Gairm Sios, Gairm Suas, and included a wealth of local (‘homemade’) compositions.

Throughout Gaelic Cape Breton, the fiddle was and remains the main instrument for community dances.

A few hundred yards from the Glebe house was the parish hall, newly built by local carpenters, where Buddy Macmaster of Judique would often play for the regular weekend dances organised to raise money for the parish.

On nights when no money was cleared after expenses, Buddy would shrug and quietly ask when they next needed him to play.

On those occasions, being underage could be a problem, which was promptly solved at least once by a kind neighbour who mentioned in passing that there was a half-pint bottle of rum in a mailbox nearby.

Even as early as the 60s the local store had closed, to be replaced by the gas station on the Trans-Canada as the place where people stopped to exchange news during the week.

One afternoon a truck hauling pulpwood pulled in driven by Johnny Williams (‘Seonaidh Aoghuis Bhig’) a well-known singer who invited me to stop by for songs at his house some three miles away.

Singing in his deep resonant voice, Johnny recorded scores of songs in settings handed down through his family from the Inner Hebrides and Morar.

Following these visits, Sarah and her brother Alec at the Glebe house would wait at the kitchen table for me to return and play back the songs.

Beside a small river and almost within sight of the parish hall lived Patrick MacEachern (‘Pàdraig Aonghuis Sìne’) with his aged mother Bella.

He was locally recognised as ‘well posted’ in the telling of sgeulachdan (traditional tales).

Despite his retiring, even shy manner, in our first session Pàdraig delivered without a pause (except to wait through the loud chiming of his clock) a fine version of a well-known international tale (ATU 956B, The Clever Maiden Alone at the Home Kills the Robbers), recorded in the western Highlands and throughout much of Europe.

Over the following decades the Glendalers mentioned here, and their neighbours, contributed some of the best material ever recorded on the island; much of that world from two generations ago, with its stories, music, understanding humour, and the families that maintained it, remains in the parish to our day. 

In 1988, Donald Archie MacDonald of the School of Studies visited John Shaw in Cape Breton and conducted fieldwork interviews. Some of the recordings are available on the Tobar an Dualchais website (www.tobarandualchais.co.uk, enter ‘2633 1988’ into the TAD search box to access these.