| Description | Ewan MacColl talks to members of traveller community from the Stewart family and others at Cookston Camp. Members of the group tell some of their stories and poems and sing some of their songs.
Track 1: a woman sings a song about the traveller life and the challenges the community faces. The song includes references to the 'local council' and 'snotty locals' locals' making life difficult 4.26 mins
Track 2: the woman is encouraged to talk about a poem she created about events fours years previously in Blairgowrie. Her description of how the poem comes about draws on circumstances they found themselves in at the time and relates to sanitation, toilets and running water, berry pickers and tinkers 4.00 mins
Track 3: the woman recites a poem about travellers being made to move from sites where they had gathered in order to earn some money berry-picking, beginning 'It happened at the berry fields, when the travellers came to Blair' 1.03 mins
Track 4: she is asked to repeat a verse from the poem 0.30 mins
Track 5: the traveller group talk about their general working conditions and how much money they might earn through manual labour in agriculture and the kinds of work involved; 'getting the tatties up' and turnips 5.44 mins
Track 6: a male traveller talks about the work he has done for someone else and a disagreement he had with his employer. The subject of the disagreement is unclear 0.44 mins
Track 7: he tells a 'ghost story' about a time near the 'Black Bull' ( Hotel ) when they were drinking tea and talking away with a another nearby group of travellers when they heard a 'roar', 'chains rattling' and 'moaning' at the 'White Gates' 5.43 mins
Track 8: a woman traveller tells a story of how we she lost a 'wee girl' due to illness in 1941 9.00 mins
Track 9: Charles Parker asks a woman traveller to talk about herself. She explains that she is not originally a traveller but that her mother was, and that she gave up travelling once she met her father. She was born in a house and was part of a large family of 11 children. 2.01 mins
Total: 33.12 mins
Dubber's reference number: PLA 2MA448A0784374 |