Scottish Identity with National Museum of Scotland’s David Forsyth
Hey fellow isolaters, I’m back, and with an episode a year in the making!
Let’s face it, I haven’t quite met my idea of a weekly podcast, but also as this quarantine, or whatever it is now, has gone on we’ve all seen there are a lot more things happening in the world than just one pandemic. Real life hasn’t exactly stopped, and if anything real life has gotten more real. Maybe this podcast is more of… an occasional distraction? A hobby I work on when other hobbies don’t hold my interest? When it’s been rainy for a week and I haven’t been out riding my bike as much? Maybe not quite as planned, but I’m back with another episode now, and I’ve got something a bit different for you this time.
Instead of focusing on what we’re doing now, I’m taking you back to a trip I took in September and October last year. My mom and I, along with my aunt and uncle, travelled to Scotland for the trip of a lifetime. We spent three weeks driving and flying around the country, visiting towns big and small, and of course trying all the local drams, cakes, and teas. We had a few reasons to go on the trip. For one, it was something my mom and I promised each other we’d do if we both finished our master’s degrees, which we did a couple years ago. My mom and aunt are also big-time knitters, and they wanted to go experience the Shetland Wool Week festival way up on the northernmost Scottish islands. And we also used the trip as a chance to explore some family history, visiting our ancestral homeland to see where our family came from prior to their arrival in Canada in the early 1900s.
I decided to take time during the trip to do some recordings for another long-planned podcast project I was going to start. As regular listeners know, that never quite happened, and it took the pandemic six months later to finally get me working. But I did make some recordings, visiting museums and talking with people around the country about Scottish identity and history that I was hoping to turn into some context for a larger project about my own family history and our journey across Scotland. As a museum worker myself, I naturally turned to the Scottish museums to learn more and I had the chance to talk with curators at some of nation’s top museums. I’ve got a few interviews recorded, so this dip into the recent archives will span a couple episodes at least. Keep in mind these were recorded in September and were supposed to be for a larger project, but I hope you enjoy them as they are.
It all started after a 36-hour day of flying from Edmonton to Glasgow, waiting for luggage that went to Amsterdam, a train trip to Edinburgh, a visit with a friend, hiking Arthur’s Seat, touring the Scottish parliament and a night catching up with my family… that was a long day.
I went early the next morning to the National Museum of Scotland to start my trip learning about the history of the Scottish people. While I was there an hour before the public opening, you will hear some noise in the background as the staff were busy cleaning and getting things opened. I was met in the galleries by the perfect person to help me find some of the museum’s iconic pieces: David Forsyth, Principal Curator of Modern and Contemporary History.
The Ross Tartan Suit
Image © National Museums Scotland. Click here to see the full item description and information on the NMS site.
Tartan designs would become a bit of a theme later in my family’s trip as we ventured through the Western Isles, even though our ancestors probably wouldn’t have worn the patterns coming from the lowlands as they did. Either way, the cultural icon was clearly visible in all the tourist shops as the stereotype of Scottish identity, but getting out to the small villages in the windswept Hebrides really helped see how the history of production reflects the landscape, agriculture, and history of Scotland. My mom and aunt both bought some reams of the cloth, I think that’s what you call it, and I was very happy to receive a little bag made of official Harris Tweed for Christmas.
I don’t have a new member of the Curious Quarantine Club to introduce in this episode! Normally I’d take this moment to play a clip from a friend or listener telling their own short story about life in isolation, or about something they’ve learned or found cool, but I haven’t received one for a bit! Instead, I’ll tell you about an old hobby I’ve gotten back into.
When I was a kid, I think about 5 or 6, my step uncle Steve gave me a diecast model of a Porsche 911. It was super cool, I loved the way the spoiler came up and the doors could open. The tires could even come off the rims, and I spent many an evening taking it apart as far as I could. And while this was a fun toy for a kid, it was probably meant to stay on a shelf, to be appreciated as a little homage to precision engineering and dreams of speed. As I grew older I was still fascinated by the idea of building a small version of something cool like that Porsche, but I’ve never really been a car guy.
Instead, I’m sure influenced by the time I spent flying over southern Ontario with my dad, I got into model airplane kits. My mom and I made a model of the Spirit of St. Louis, the airplane Charles Lindbergh flew in solo across the Atlantic in 1927. The thick silver enamel paint showed so many misapplications of paint and a dozen or so thumbprints from a not-so-dextrous nine-year-old.
The first model I did, or remember doing, mostly on my own was my favourite plane, the P-51D Mustang. I was probably 10 or 11 by then and the quality is a lot better, but I ripped the final decal, a black and white checkerboard pattern that went around the nose, so it was never finished. Maybe I’m a bit of a hoarder, but I still have that plane, now with a broken wheel and lost exhaust duct, because I keep telling myself someday I’ll find a decal sheet and finish it.
The original P-51D kit
This Revell kit (I think) was the first real project I did mainly on my own. Today, after a couple moves crammed in a shoe box, it sits with a broken wheel, missing parts, and still-unfinished nose decals. Someday…
I’ve come and gone from the model kits since the ill-fated Mustang, making a handful of models over the years and even getting into paper models, which was super fun and a much cheaper version of the hobby. But throughout that two decade span one thing has remained constant: I keep buying model kits! I went to the big airshow in Oshkosh, Wisconsin with my dad five times as a teenager, each time coming back with one or three gently packed into my suitcase. Their crumpled boxes are still on my shelf. I’d stop by the hobby store and like any book store visit – my other guilty pleasure – I’d leave with a couple old discount boxes, probably missing parts or so old they aren’t worth the plastic they’re made of. I even bought one in Japan and, go figure, haven’t made it yet because the instructions are all in Japanese!!!
The Stack!
Crammed into the shelf above my closet is my “stack,” the pile of unmade kit boxes that include one with no English instructions, some that have been crushed, and a few 1960s-era made-in-the-USSR kits!
About the end of making the third episode of this podcast, I was looking at the stack of boxes jammed up in the corner of my closet, thinking of all the potential fun that could be had, and decided finally to get some done and off the pile. Because it’s been a year since I last made one, and about five years since I’ve made them consistently, I started with a couple old kits to practice. I made an Airfix Spitfire that turned out was a snap-together kit, but it was still challenging and was good practice for painting. Because I made a Spitfire, I had to make it’s nemesis, a Messerschmitt BF-109 E. This was an even older model, molded in a bright blue plastic for some reason. I had to go through three paint conversion charts to match the paint colours they make today, and I accidentally made the cockpit windows opaque, but making these two old kits was fun and good practice for the modern kits.
Just tonight I finished up one of the kits I’ve been saving for 15 years: an SR-71 Blackbird by the model company Revell Monogram. It turned out to be a struggle actually, the instructions weren’t always helpful and the parts are pretty delicate, but it looks cool finished now. I’m going to give it to my friend Peter as a very late thanks for helping me move last year.
With all this practice, I’m going to try my first ship model next, a much newer kit of the Second World War Japanese aircraft carrier Zuikaku. It is 1/700 scale, meaning the little airplanes that will sit on its deck are 1 centimetre long. And I have to paint them three colours… and put decals on them. Let me know what you think, is my practice paying off? What airplane kit should I make next?
If you want to join my Curious Quarantine Club, send a short audio message about what you’re curious about or doing in isolation to wellthatscoolpod@gmail.com. I hope to hear from you on a future episode!
Now back to my conversation with David Forsyth, this time talking to me about industrial history presented in the museum as another important form of modern Scottish identity.
The last time I was in Edinburgh I visited the National Museum of Scotland just as they closed some galleries for the final stages of a major multi-year re-development. This time I got to see it all, from the Lewis Chessmen to Dolly the Sheep, and everything in between. As the bells tolled for 10:00 am and the doors opened to the public, David brought me down to the main floor to frame the museum as a part of Scottish identity itself.
A big thanks to David Forsyth, Principal Curator of Modern and Contemporary History at the National Museum of Scotland for taking me on a tour of the museum’s Scottish history galleries. Thanks also to Elaine Macintyre and my friend Rob Cawston for helping arrange my visit. The NMS museums have started re-opening in August, and If you get the chance to travel to Scotland again, I highly recommend visiting the museum. And until then, why not visit nms.ac.uk to explore and learn about the museum’s online collections through their Museum at Home pages. It’s really cool to relive my visit right on my computer or phone.
Thanks as always to Ron Yamauchi for the theme tune and to Anna Schroeder of Annather Design for the cool podcast logo, check out her work at annatherdesign.com. Other music heard during this episode and all the other podcast stuff is done by me, Ben Fast.
If you want to join my Curious Quarantine Club, visit the website at benfast.ca/cool or send a short audio message about what you’re curious about or doing in isolation to wellthatscoolpod@gmail.com. While you’re there, suggest something for me to look into for the podcast! You can find the show on Twitter at “well_thatscool” or Facebook at wellthatscoolpod, and don’t forget to subscribe, rate and review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts!
Until next time, thanks for listening and have fun being curious, staying safe, and washing your hands!
