Time Travels

Susan Morrison and Len Pennie explore what it takes to be King in medieval Scotland, where ruthlessness and brutality where qualities at the top of the job description.

Aberdeen is soon getting the Baird Family hospital for Maternity, Neonatal and Reproductive Medicine - but who were the Baird family and why is it named after them? Dr Alison McCall clues in Susan Morrison on Sir Dugald, his wife, Lady May Baird, son Professor David and daughter Dr Joyce Baird. From Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Shauna Irani introduces Susan to Ned Burke, her favourite person from the poignant Jacobite collection of relics and accounts of sufferings ’The Lyon in Mourning’. Their website for their 'Lyon in Mourning' project is https://dhil.lib.sfu.ca/lyoninmourning/And how did you tell the future in the past and what did people think about it? Dr Martha McGill of Warwick University has the answers.

Bee keeping, basket weaving - if you lost limbs in WW1, you might need to retrain for a job, Louise Bell of Leeds University tells Susan Morrison about the Erskine Hospital and a Gordon Highlander who wanted to go there. Servicemen of an earlier age might find care more rough and ready - Dr Catherine Beck of Copenhagen University looks at mental health in the age of Nelson’s navy and why it was thought to be such a pressing issue. In the 18th century electricity was thought to be mysterious and scary, and there was still a whiff of that into the 20th century when savvy female demonstrators were wanted to try and get the highland housewife happy with the power supply of the future. Join us as we travel across the centuries.

It’s one of Scotland’s almost forgotten campaigns. James Graham the charismatic Marquess of Montrose and his allies occupied Orkney in 1649 - they were planning to invade the Scottish mainland. Would the islanders turn out to fight? Dr Andrew Lind of the Institute for Northern Studies takes Susan Morrison through the battle that came next and its tragic aftermath. On a lighter wartime note, Susan chats to Dr Michelle Moffat, Tutor at Otago University in New Zealand about how Scots took their holidays in World War 2 and how sometimes there was nothing the authorities could do but to gnash their teeth.

Right in the heart of what’s now Glasgow's 'Merchant City', there was a vanished industry we rarely ever talk about. Dr Jade Halbert, Lecturer in Design Studies at the University of Leeds introduces Susan Morrison to Glasgow’s lost rag trade and what happened to it. Moving back in time to the 16th century we explore the biggest scandal of the early Reformation church - the firebrand minister of Dundee who spectacularly fell from grace. Dr Bess Rhodes of St Andrews University has been digging into the very chequered career of Paul Methven and his relations to women.

Susan Morrison explores the real life behind modern dark mediaeval fantasy. Were Scottish nobles really getting starved to death in dungeons? Who by? Dr Katy Jack has the answers. Once you lost your land in the Highland clearances, how did you fight to get it back? Juliette Desportes of Glasgow University looks at the Galson raiders in Lewis. And finally, are you melancholy? Does your parrot have a ‘looseness’? You might need an 18th century recipe book. Susan chats with Dr Charlotte Holmes about their contents

Susan Morrison explores cabbage - no, not the stuff that used to bulk out the school dinners, but a mysteriously legal perk they used to carve out of the rag trade. Fashion historian Dr Jade Halbert of Leeds University has the goods on Scotland’s surprising contribution to cabbage history. A bit of sly cabbaging might get you a cheap designer wedding dress, but would a Scottish bride have changed her name in times gone by? Dr Rebecca Mason has the answers and they might surprise you. Scottish traditions were different - find out why. And what does a real dungeon look like? Susan and Dr Katy Jack get medieval.

Yes we’ve all heard about Vikings and monasteries but there’s a lot more to it than that - they might make you a business offer you couldn’t refuse but their fashion and language really caught on. Dr Adrián Maldonado of National Museums of Scotland, author of 'Crucible of Nations: Scotland from Viking age to Medieval kingdoms' chats to Susan Morrison about the new cultures emerging in 9th-11th century ‘Scotland’. Norse culture in the Northern isles produced striking carved stones and in the 20th century a Shetlander with a love of carving stone heads came to Montrose asylum - Adam Christie - he’s just one of the people whose work is represented in the Art Extraordinary collection which Dr Cheryl McGeachan is so fascinated by. It’s art work made by people in asylums who had a yearning to create - from Adam Christie’s stone heads to Mrs McGilp’s fluorescent bunnies from Aberdeen.

Susan Morrison explores with Dr Callum Watson how King Robert Bruce and Sir James Douglas were best chivalric buddies in the wars of independence and how chivalry was nothing to do with throwing down cloaks for ladies over muddy puddles. Dr Désha Osborne and Lisa Williams introduce us to the Garifuna people and the horrific colonial violence they faced in 18th century St Vincent. Scots settlers trying to make their fortunes played a prominent part. Moving back in time, Susan talks to Dr Adrián Maldonado of National Museums of Scotland about what was going on up here before the Vikings got a foothold.

Dr Jade Halbert of the University of Huddersfield would have loved to be alive in the sixties! She introduces Susan Morrison to the glories of Glasgow’s boutique culture where you could finally buy trendy clothes your mum wouldn’t be seen dead in and listen to music your dad would shout at. Emily Hay of Glasgow University heads for the not-so-swinging 1560s and looks at why you might use a sonnet sequence to help frame a queen for murder. Did Mary Queen of Scots have her own poems taken down and twisted against her? And is she a much more important Scottish female author than we realise?

Susan Morrison catches up with Dr Katie Barclay of Adelaide University to find out what life was like for Scotland’s travelling poor in the 18th century - were we more generous back then, and how hard a life was it for women tramping the road? But if it gave you sore feet, might there have been an ancient remedy for that? Dr Sharon Arbuthnot of Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, Scotland’s National Centre for Gaelic Language in the Isle of Skye has been digging into the Gaelic medical manuscripts of the middle ages. They’re a treasure trove of cures, charms and surprising uses for bits of bird and animal - all plugged into the learned culture of Europe, and we meet someone who might have used the services of the learned medical men who wrote the books - Christina MacRuairi - a key supporter of King Robert Bruce. Dr Callum Watson of National Trust for Scotland has the story.

Susan Morrison gets to grips with the South Queensferry witch-hunt. We know about the horrors which people accused of witchcraft suffered but we very rarely get to see what happens to their families. How could you try to save your accused loved ones? Who did you have to take on and what could they do to you in return? Dr Ciaran Jones and Dr Louise Yeoman follow one family in the South Queensferry witch hunt of 1643-44 with Susan and look at how they took on the authorities and with what results. Moving forward in time to 1813 in Glasgow, we find another family - the Hastings who want to keep a wee ten year old boy they’ve adopted called John Fee but then John’s dad turns up and he isn’t happy. Dr Katie Barclay of Adelaide University helps us look at child stealing and what counts as a good home for a child among the very poorest people in Scottish society.

Susan Morrison reckons you can’t have a mediaeval Hollywood movie without knights in shining armour but wants to know when did the Norman knight come to Scotland and who was hiring him? Dr Fiona Watson has the answers and it’s earlier than you might think. But if you wanted to refight those historic battles on your living room carpet, you’d need some toy soldiers. They’ve always had a topical side to them too, reflecting whatever conflict was going on at the time. The great age of the lead toy soldier covered the big conflicts of the 20th century and sparked controversy about war toys - did they cause war-mongering or were they good for your kid’s mental development? Euan Loarridge of Glasgow University has been in the miniature trenches examining their campaigns. And we’re kicking off an investigation into a witch-hunt in South Queensferry with Dr Ciaran Jones - more on that next time.

Susan Morrison explores the rich and sometimes murky depths of Scotland's past.

Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia- the Scottish princess born in Dunfermline who could have become Elizabeth I of Scotland and II of England is the subject of Dr Nadine Akkerman’s book. Susan Morrison asks Nadine how close to the thrones of Britain this remarkable woman got and about her sometimes stormy relationship with her brother, the future Charles I. Leaping ahead in time, we hit the railways and discover the perils of scoffing on your commute Dickensian-style. Chloe Shields of the University of Strathclyde has the low down on fashionable Victorian maladies and the dining car.

How do you write a persuasive letter in your poshest Scots to the Queen of England? Susan Morrison would like to know. So let's meet Annas Keith, Countess of Moray, at one time Scotland’s first lady. After her husband's assassination, she was trying to hang onto Mary Queen of Scots’ splendid jewels, Dr Jade Scott of Glasgow University shows us how Annas went about it. Leaping forward to Victorian times and Dundee’s extremely not posh Overgate, Dr Hannah Telling explores a murder in a tenement stair which reveals surprising things about the residents’ attitudes.

Alison Rough was a 16th century Edinburgh war widow - her husband was killed at Flodden and she was left raising a family on her own - which she did in her own feisty and formidable manner - often with the cards stacked against her. Professor Elizabeth Ewan formerly of the University of Guelph takes presenter Susan Morrison into Alison’s world. Raising a family on your own was tough in the 16th century but even as late as the 1970s in Scotland for single mums who refused marriage it was well-nigh unthinkable - they found stigma rather than respect. The result was that many young women got caught up in ‘shotgun weddings’ more in Scotland than in England and Wales. Oral historian Kristin Hay of Strathclyde University explores why.

Are you sure that cat is just a cat? Accused witches in Scotland (who were over 80% female) were sometimes believed to have shape-shifted into animal form - but why? Nicole Cumming, researching at Strathclyde University, has been on the trail and she shares her research with Susan Morrison. Women’s lives changed a lot between the 1950s and 1990s - but how far did they come in terms of escaping domestic abuse? Dr Anni Donaldson, Honorary Research Fellow at Strathclyde University takes Susan into the toxic attitudes and lack of help available to women facing violence and coercive control, and if you're affected by these issues, please see bottom right under 'related links' for the BBC Action line on domestic abuse. Our series ends with Lost Villages of Ayrshire - places like Glenbuck and Benquhat. The houses have gone but can the stories be recovered? Dr Yvonne McFadden of Strathclyde University is part of an oral history project which has been finding out how a woman’s work was never done in the miners’ rows. If you're from one of those villages and want to get in touch with the project, you can email her on y.mcfadden@strath.ac.uk up till the end of October 2021.

If you were poor what kind of medical help could you expect in the Highlands and islands in the 1850s? You’d better believe there were some pretty grim remedies in your future. Dr Daisy Cunynghame heritage manager and librarian of the Royal College of Physicians, Edinburgh introduces Susan Morrison to ‘Remote and rural remedies’ their new online resource on Highland medicine then and now. You might have been better off with your local accused witch in earlier days. Dr Sierra Dye of Guelph University Canada takes Susan into a zealous witch-hunter’s first case and the rare healing charms it reveals. If healing wasn’t your thing, there was always poison, but by the Victorian period forensic experts like the accomplished Dr Henry Littlejohn of Edinburgh were hot on the heels of murderers. Louise Wilkie of Surgeons’ Hall Museums Edinburgh introduces us to one of his most difficult cases.

If you think the Darien Venture for Scottish settlers to colonise part of the isthmus of Panama and set up a trading hub was only a disaster, think again. Even though nothing about imperial projects is very moral, they’re still windows into many lives. In this case women - Dr Gina Bennett of the University of Arlington at Texas joins Susan Morrison to take us into the worlds of 1690s Scottish female investors, businesswomen and settlers. There’s getting into empire and there’s getting out of it. Samuel Hume at Aberdeen University is researching imperial conferences. What’s one of them? Find out how the British self-governing settler colonies - the dominions like Australia, Canada and New Zealand moved towards full independence with Sam (He’s also a podcaster doing his own history of the British empire at Pax Britannica - https://paxbritannica.info/ ) Finally, the women who would have won ‘Most Wicked Lady in Scotland!’ several years running had it been an award category in James VI’s kingdom: Elizabeth Stewart Countess of Arran, but was she just getting a bad rap from her enemies? Lisa Baer-Tsarfati of Guelph University explores female ambition.