Hail to the smokin’ Scots

 

The Macdonald Tobacco Company used images of Scottish Highlanders to advertise their product.

This is just one of the peculiar facts in an attractive new book published by Véhicule Press called The Scots of Montreal. Edited by Nancy Marrelli and Simon Dardick, who together run Véhicule Press, the book was based on material from a recent McCord Museum exhibition on the same subject.

Among the familiar names in the book are furtrader Simon McTavish, philanthropist James McGill, mayor Peter McGill (who, confusingly, were not related), architect Percy Erskine Nobbs and photographer William Notman.

Many of the entrepreneurs who built industrial Montreal were Scots who felt socially suppressed in Great Britain, the book says. As well as being energetic entrepreneurs, they held education in high regard, and were the driving force behind anglophone Montreal’s colleges, hospitals, churches, libraries and social philanthropy.

Marrelli, who is also Concordia’s Archivist, has written several previous books, including Montreal Photo Album / Montréal: Un album de photos, and a lively book based on the extensive collection of jazz sheet music and night club memorabilia in Concordia’s own archives.