A Scottish scholar and his American wife bought an island, spent decades preserving Gaelic culture

Campbell and Margaret moved to Canna in 1938 after spending three years living on Barra. John Lorne Campbell and Margaret Fay Shaw had already spent years recording Gaelic songs, stories and traditions when they made the remote Isle of Canna their home in 1938. The Scottish folklorists continued that work from the island for more than four decades before Campbell gifted Canna, their home, library, archives and sound recordings to the National Trust for Scotland.According to the Trust, Campbell was born in Argyll on October 1, 1906. The eldest son of Colonel Duncan Campbell of Inverneill and his American wife, Ethel Waterbury of New Jersey, he was educated at Cargilfield School in Edinburgh and Rugby. He later studied Rural Economy at St John’s College, Oxford, as well as Celtic under Professor John Fraser of Jesus College.His interest in Gaelic had started in childhood and grew during his time at Oxford. With the help of Fraser, who became his mentor, Campbell began working on a Gaelic anthology. His first published book, Highland Songs of the Forty-Five, appeared in 1933.That same year, his work took him to the Outer Hebrides. He arrived on Barra on August 4, 1933, to study crofti...