Old Folklore

[Canadian Livingstone]

Dear Kin, I have spent many enjoyable hours learning about our shared ancient past and have an elderly 88 year old father who is spending his last few years on this planet connecting with his Morvern/Isle of Lismore Maconlea ancestors through the Young Baron's wonderful tales. It is for these reasons that I feel such a deep sense of hurt that some of you have turned your back on the "old folklore", some I dare say have turned their back on their historic Gaelic roots completely. I respect everyones right to their oppinions, but I cannot accept the notion that all the Livingstone history of the past is nothing more than "old folklore". Many of those fine highland researchers and authors are no longer with us, so they clearly lack the ability to defend the so called "old folklore" of the Argyll Livingstones. I came to this site because I thought this was the place where I would find some appreciation of our ancient gaelic history instead I feel ridiculed and unappreciated for defending it. Sincerely yours, Donald Livingston Clink   

[Andrew Lancaster4]

Dear Donald I don't know what worried you, but the sentiment I have seen most often discussed on this forum is that we wish we had more "old folklore" to work with, and certainly appreciate its value. I think the majority of people who contribute here wish they could discuss their Scottish roots with their own ancestors, but unfortunately most of us are several generations away from such people. So this forum gives a chance to gather what is left to be gathered I suppose. The DNA project, similarly, is aimed to gather whatever snippets of information that we can in order to try to work out the past. Regards Andrew

[Keith Livingstone Australia]

Donald; keep at it. I don't know why anyone would ridicule what you're doing, but it certainly isn't true Livingstone behaviour the way I understand it. I've personally loved your postings and the huge amount of research that's gone into them... especially about Miles Livingstone et al. Fascinating.

[Kyle2 MacLea]

Dear Donald, Please don't feel ridiculed at all!  Your work is important and as much as we can gather of the old folklore is _immensely_ important for us!  If anything, I wish I had more to contribute to the cause, but I love hearing everyone's stories and histories.  My grandfather had an intense interest in his family history, but I gather that his family wasn't one that kept in touch very well, so some of the old tales were lost once the family began to spread out in the USA.  That being said, I love hearing what you have to say, so please don't ever feel like your input is not valued.  But also don't feel like if I don't respond, I don't appreciate it! I read every single post on this Forum, every single day where I can get to a computer.  Some days, though, I don't have anything to add, or just can't wrap my head around the history enough to give help.  I am very impressed with your family knowledge and that of every contributor of the Forum! Let's all keep working with that 'old folklore' to help us put together our family history even more! Thanks, Donald! Kyle=

[Bachuil]

A Dhòmhnaill a charaid, First may I thank you for your kind words.  I am so pleased that your father is enjoying our tales - everyone of which is the gospel. However, I am distressed that you feel that your are unappreciated in any way.  I try to keep a very light touch on the tiller that guides this forum and do not always agree with all the sentiments or opinions expressed. However, from my perspective I feel, perhaps naively, that no-one has intended to cause offence. There are too few of us to fall out.  (As an aside great mirth was created at school when matron ticked off the Head of House, no less, with these immortal words "Dewar, if you don't tuck your sheets in, you and I are going to fall out!" Nevertheless, I am concerned that other discussion groups, no matter how well intentioned, may end up dividing and destroying our fledgling clan forum.  This is a relevant and pertinent issue as we have our Australian and New Zealand Clan Society considering web pages, we have the DNA project and the Yahoo groups.  Rob Livingston passed me all the Birth Records which he had on his site as I think he felt it was better to have the one site.  I shall start a discussion on this with others off line and take a view. Le teann measa Niall

[Canadian Livingstone]

Dear Young Bachuil, I appreciate your concern, but the truth of the matter is that I am probably not being entirely fair to the others who rightly or wrongly believe what they believe and have every right to believe it. It goes without saying that Rob, Andrew, Keith and whole lot of other folks connected to the forum spend a large proportion of their waking life on Livingstone family research and are passionately committed to it. Maybe it goes with being a Maconlea. We have been forced to give up our broadswords and shields for a keyboard I guess. There is a fantastic amount of enthusiasm among your father's "lost sheep" to get their family history right and none cannot be faulted for that. I suppose its the natural way of things not to see eye to eye on everything and for people to attempt to challenge establised notions about the Highland Livingstones. All that I ask is that we respect each others right to disagree. And yes I guess one solution could be to start up on own independent Livingstone webpages. What would mine be? Perhaps Radio Free Livingstone or Donald McMaelmoire the Great Pretender.com, People's Democratic REpublic of Moulag.com. I could probably come up with a few more equally as silly, but I will stop here. The trend out there is for people to do their own webpages and I guess thats bound to continue. I dont know that there would be support out there for one democratically based Livingstone family website, though I wish were so. Your family information and interesting articles on the Clan have brought tears to my father's eyes on numerous occasions. He is so impressed by your unselfish commitment to ordinary folks like us. I think his view of a Baron or a Barons's son is some one who is aloof, aristocratic and snobby. That certainly does not describe you or your father. At breakfast my Dad often asks me to read him about the Baron and his interesting life. He especially enjoyed the stories about the Staff. Also Donald Livingstone of Movern is big on his list. My Mother died of Alzheimers in October, so anything these days that cheers him up and keeps his spirits up is a positive thing. I will probably get him a book on Dr. David Livingstone for his birthday in May.  My father as a boy never understood in the 1920's why his father referred to the Livingstones back in Scotland as aristocrats. I had thought them to be poor tenant farmers at best. (In fact some of them were skilled carpenters/boatbuilders that probably left Morvern by the 1780's for the Isle of Islay where they found employment.) At this time, the Livingstones had an unusually, benevelent Campbell landlord at Movern who was not evicting his tenants and emigration to the Americas was not the only option for the family. As we had no aristocrats in our family, I suspect old Nancy Livingston must of been talking about one of your relatives that in some way or another was connected to Miles Livingston, Nancy's father. A family mystery to be certain. Yes I guess when you put it that way it would make more sense to pick myself up rather than fall and support the long term interests of the Clan than to just give up in despair. I mean the thing one needs to ask is what would Baron Alistair do in a situation like this. I'm sure he never gave up on anything in his long illustrious career. sincerely yours, Donald Livingstone Clink    

[Andrew Lancaster4]

Just a short note: I was concerned when I started the DNA yahoo group about splitting off people who could better discuss their interests here. On the other hand I needed a place where people, many of whom do not see themselves as connected to this clan, could discuss their results. In effect, the group has become something of a project "blog" which I think is fulfilling the main needs I had. It does not seem to have caused any major diversion of discussion from this clan forum. Best Regards Andrew

[Kyle2 MacLea]

Dear Donald, Your enthusiasm IS appreciated on the Forum. Though I don't say it frequently, I love hearing all the stories, the old Folklore, the known histories, and I love hearing people argue over them, so that we all might understand the strengths and weaknesses of each hypothesis. That being said, if some of us don't reply to your ideas, don't think we don't value them!  I always like hearing more! My own family has NO folklore to pass on about itself.  I have gotten some basic genealogy from my grandparents, that included stories of my great-great grandfather, of a VERY basic nature, and some about my great grandfather, and that's it. Would that I had more to share about the family history!  Alas, my family had lost its Gaelic interest in maintaining the genealogy and tales of the family, at least until they had been in this country long enough that they didn't remember any of that anymore! So, keep on sharing the folklore and I'll keep listening.  I may not write much, but I'll be reading! As for independent webpages, there is a role for having some pages elsewhere.  Andrew needs to be able to update the DNA project pages frequently, so he maintains his own page for that.  For me, I have my own pages, which will include the page on this DNA cluster which would be of little interest to anyone not a part of it, but which can be read by anyone.  As long as we have links to these pages from this website or Forum, I think it's okay to put material up in other places, don't you?   I don't think the Young Bachuil can really put everything up on his own website, from all the material collected out there on the web!  But that's my opinion, of course. Anyway, love hearing more, and so glad that your father is really enjoying it as well.  Wish I had more to share! Kyle=

[Canadian Livingstone]

Hi Kyle, I think sometimes in everything whether its a marriage or a job or whatever, you reach a point where you have some decisions about whether to continue or not. Sometimes you have to be honest about your feelings and I honestly wasn't certain I was comfortable continuing with the Clan group if couldnt somehow get some sort of guarrantee the old Maclea-Livingstone stories weren't going to be discarded by the Clan. Now the Young Bachuil as Chieftain could of just said your rocking my boat get off my ship, but instead he fairly considered my concerns and addressed a few of his own. The Young Bachuil has suggested that some discussion at a later date on some of these issues would be useful to the Clan. In the end my decision to stay with the Clan group had alot to do with the Chief's sound reasoning. As I said before Kyle I am not entirely certain that your ancestors weren't Highland McLEas. Some of those Antrim McCains that you share similar DNA traits with perhaps have an connection to the Ardnamurchan McCains that fled the Highlands after the GLencoe Slaughter in the 1690's. I guess on a positive note I helped to get people back to the site and thinking one way or another on important Clan issues. regards Donald

[Kyle2 MacLea]

Actually, Donald, I agree! My 'null' hypothesis, if you will, is that my family is a group of Highland McLeas.  I believe that though they are not of the same patrilineal line as the Chiefs of McLea, that they descend from the Clan, a group of McLeas that moved to the Isle of Bute, and perhaps also related to those McLeas across the water in Greenock. My relationship with the McCains is unknown, but there are many reasonable possibilities.  I will look more into these Ardnamurchan McCains, because they are not something I know much about! Thanks, Donald!  We are on the same wavelength here -- just trying to make sense of things! Kyle=