X Marks the Scot - An on-line community of kilt wearers.

   X Marks Partners - (Go to the Partners Dedicated Forums )
USA Kilts website Celtic Croft website Celtic Corner website Houston Kiltmakers

User Tag List

Results 1 to 10 of 20

Threaded View

  1. #8
    Join Date
    18th October 09
    Location
    Orange County California
    Posts
    11,325
    Mentioned
    18 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    About the Scottish Cringe, one thing that's nice to see is Scottish actors and Scottish accents becoming seen and heard more in the worldwide media.

    Sean Connery was dismissed by the English powers-that-be in the London film industry as being

    "too tall, too dark, and too Scottish"

    and when he won the role of James Bond he had to create the hybrid accent that he's used ever since.

    The London film industry is full of Scottish actors who have had to adopt English accents to work, as recently as David Tennant (Dr Who), several of the Games Of Thrones cast, and Martin Compson (Line Of Duty).

    The first step is allowing Scottish actors to use their own accents in English shows, as David Tennant did in Broadchurch.

    It seems that finally here in the USA we're getting quality TV programmes filmed in Scotland with Scottish casts using their own accents such as Outlander, The Nest, The Loch, and Deadwater Fell. Practically every TV programme my wife and I have been watching features Scottish actors and/or is set in Scotland with a Scottish cast.

    About my own ancestry, as you've seen genealogy is huge here in the USA. Many US families have a family story, a family Origin Myth as it were, and online databases and DNA testing have fed our fascination with where we come from.

    I was raised not knowing much about our family history. My father tried to pass what he knew on to me, but I was a stupid kid and didn't pay attention. It's taken me decades of research to piece together all the stuff he knew! (He passed away when I was in my 20s.)

    Now I know much, and just last month my son and I travelled the old stomping grounds in West Virginia, the epicentre of the Cooks, where we've been since the 18th century. A man in the first Cook generation born in America intermarried with a Stewart woman in the first generation to be born in America (the four parents of this couple were born in Scotland, Scotland, Ulster, and England) and the Cooks and the Stewarts continue to intermarry to this day, there in southwest West Virginia.

    I've only found out the Stewart connection recently. I think my father always knew about it!

    About wearing the kilt, that came not from knowing about any Scottish ancestry but because at the age of 17 I took up playing the pipes.

    My grandmother made my first two kilts.

    Here's the first photo of me piping. I'm wearing my first kilt, that my grandmother made from ordinary plaid wool I found at a local fabric shop. This would have been 1975.



    Here by 1977 I had acquired more kit! I won an art contest and spent the prize money on a feather bonnet. The sporran was an old one I bought for $15 and restored. This is the second kilt my grandmother made for me, from real Scottish tartan, in Macdonald Of the Isles Hunting. I made the doublet and plaid myself.

    Last edited by OC Richard; 31st July 20 at 09:39 AM.
    Proud Mountaineer from the Highlands of West Virginia; son of the Revolution and Civil War; first Europeans on the Guyandotte

  2. The Following 4 Users say 'Aye' to OC Richard For This Useful Post:


Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •  

» Log in

User Name:

Password:

Not a member yet?
Register Now!
Powered by vBadvanced CMPS v4.2.0