STORYTELLING FESTIVAL EVENT AT HOY KIRK

This Saturday (29 October) we look forward to welcoming storytellers from Norway, Sweden and Kirkwall to the Hoy Kirk for ‘Viking Tales’, part of the Orkney Storytelling Festival. The event kicks off at 2:30pm. Details here.

HOY FOLKLORE

We enjoyed hearing Hoy tales from Tom Muir at the Hoy heritage project launch back in June. The recordings of his stories from that evening can be listened to through the new Hoy Folklore page on our website. You can hear all about how the Hoy hills came to be, hear tales of the Dwarfie stane and  Trowie Glen and more.

We hope the archive can become a place to share the folklore of Hoy. Do you know any lore about the people and places of Hoy? You can contact us here.

EXHIBITION NEWS

This is the last week for the ‘James Sinclair, Botanist from the Bu’ show at Hoy Kirk, but it isn’t your last chance to see the exhibition. We are delighted that the show is moving to Stromness Museum for their Winter Exhibition. The museum, opened in 1837 by the Orkney Natural History Society, will be a great venue for the Botanist from the Bu.

The exhibition launch night will be Friday 11th November, starting at 7:30pm. With introduction by Bea Watson, Great grandniece of James Sinclair and an illustrated talk on the flora of Hoy by Orkney plant recorder, John Crossley.

A commissioned artwork by Orkney artist Laura Drever will be part of the exhibition, so for those of you who have seen the exhibition at the kirk it will be well worth a trip to the museum. Laura joined the walk ‘In the footsteps of James Sinclair’ and created a drawing about her experience of the day.

The show will run until March 2012. The winter hours at the museum are Mon-Sat 11am to 3:30pm. The show has been supported by the Scapa Flow Landscape partnership Scheme.

This will be the last opportunity (until 4 November) to catch the display of Mavis Strudwick’s Hoy plant studies. The drawings will be part of the Hoy heritage archives and will shortly be viewable online.

HOY’S BEST LOVED CHARACTER COMES TO THE KIRK

Our next exhibition will be all about the Old Man of Hoy. Starting late November the exhibition will celebrate the highs and highs of Orkney’s landmark.From birds to climbers everyone loves the Old Man – a climbing couple recently got engaged at the top. The stack was the star of what was described as the first TV reality show, when 15 million views tuned in to watch the live 1967 ascent.

image from BBC Great Climb

We hope to build up the show over the months with new items – remember everything that is submitted to the archive is scanned and handed back, so you can keep hold of your originals and still be part of the archive. So far we have photographs and postcards, artwork and poems, interviews and newspaper cuttings.

Contact the archive here if you have something for the Old Man show.

NEW SUBMISSIONS TO THE ARCHIVE

Nearly every week we get a new submission to the archive. One photograph of Mary Mowatt with her mother and an ox lead to an interview with Mary, now in her nineties. Mary even recalled the name of the ox – he was called ‘Jack’. You can hear a part of that interview here.

This photograph was submitted by Mary Mackay née Moar. The people in the portrait have been identified as James and Betty Ritch of the Shore, Rackwick.

This corrugated iron shed was the shop in Rackwick, run by TH Rendall of The Glen. The shop was painted red and had windows at the front. On top of the oatstack is Jack Rendall and the lady is possibly Elizabeth Gerrie a visitor from Stromness.  The Glen can be seen in the background with its nissen hut still there.

Were you at this 1952 dance at the Hoy hall? We are going to attempt to name all the faces.

There will soon be a page on the Hoy heritage website for new submissions. Thank you to all who have handed photographs in for scanning. 

ARCHIVING THE PRESENT

We are keen to record the community of now. It’s important that the archive is an ongoing project and that we document how life in Hoy is in the present as well as the past.

As part of this, a photographic census of Hoy is happening! So if you live in the Hoy parish expect a visit from Pearl Sinclair if she hasn’t already been. Pearl has been photographing people in front of their houses, with their animals, or doing what they like to do. It’s grand to see that taking shape.

IT’S JUST YOUR CUP OF TEA

It’s been great to have the Wild Heather Tearoom at the Hot Kirk every Friday. Fine china and good chat with Derek & Helen’s soup and cakes. The tearoom will be open all through winter 11-3.