This is an open and entertaining memoir of a post-war childhood, growing up and living on the island of Burray, Orkney, off Scotland’s north coast.

among the author’s reminiscences are:

  • the town hall cinema;

  • neep hoeing competitions;

  • encountering jelly fish at Scapa Flow;

  • being lowered into the well to sort out the family’s water supply one dry summer;

  • cutting peats;

  • making an electric blanket and, a highlight of the year;

  • the traditional New Year’s Day ba’ game (‘more like a small scale civil war’)

These recollections of island life sixty years ago will fascinate and amuse the modern-day reader.

Duncan Cameron Mackenzie was born on Burray, Orkney, in 1949. His varied career includes being in the Royal Air Force and in the Scottish Army Parachute Battalion. He now lives in South Africa.

Mark Mulhern is a Researcher in the EERC, University of Edinburgh.

Caroline Milligan is part of a team looking after the Archives at the School of Scottish Studies; her work is centred around the Sound Archive.

The General Editor of the Flashbacks series is Professor Alexander Fenton.

Published by: NMS Enterprises Limited – Publishing with the European Ethnological Research Centre (EERC) as part of the Flashbacks series of oral histories.

Dimensions: 196 x 128mm.