Facts

Blue Plaques

• Did you know Murray Street, located off Fisherwick Place in Belfast has a Blue Plaque by the Ulster History Circle to mark the famous Ulster-Scot Sir James Murray? Murray is known as the inventor of Milk of Magnesia.

• Did you know an Ulster History Circle Blue Plaque can be found at the birthplace of Lord Kelvin in College Square, Belfast? more »

• Did you know a Blue Plaque commemorating John Boyd Dunlop can be found on a building at 38/42 May Street, Belfast, where his workshop was situated?

• Did you know there is a Blue Plaque in the honour of Ulster-Scot Robert Lloyd Praeger and his sister in Holywood, County Down? more »

• Did you know there are a number of memorials in honour of Ulster-Scot Harry Ferguson? A commemorative plaque is displayed at the family farm in Growell, near Dromore, while an Ulster History Circle Blue Plaque is located on the Ulster Bank building in Donegal Square East, Belfast. The site is the former showroom of Harry Ferguson Limited. There is also a granite memorial to Ferguson\\\\\\\'s pioneering flight located on the North Promenade in Newcastle, County Down.

Burns

• Did you know that in 1793, Samuel Thomson, the Bard of Carngranny, dedicated a volume of his poetry to ‘Mr Robert Burns, the Ayrshire poet’? In 1794, he travelled to Dumfries to meet and exchange poems with Burns.

• Did you know that in 1786 the Belfast News Letter was the first newspaper outside Scotland to publish extracts of the poetry of Robert Burns?

• Did you know James Magee of Bridge Street, Belfast, published the first edition of Burns’ poetry outside Scotland? It was published in 1787.

• Did you know Burns’ poetry was published with a glossary? In Ulster, volumes of Burns are found with the poems well-thumbed, but the glossary in almost pristine condition. more »

• Did you know The Linen Hall Library in Belfast is home to The Gibson Collection, one of the finest examples of Burns material in the world?

General

• Did you know David Manson was an Ulsterman who started the first playschool in Belfast in 1751?

• Did you know the Thomas Andrews Manuscript Collection - located in the Special Collections section at the main library of Queen\\\\\\\'s University, Belfast - includes around 85 items which were donated to the university by the Andrews\\\\\\\' family in 1935? The items include printed books, unpublished drafts and proofs, manuscript working notes and correspondence by - and addressed to - Thomas Andrews. Thomas Andrews was a famous Ulster man.

• Did you know Ulsterman William Thomson became Baron Kelvin of Largs in 1892 at the age of 68? The title is from the River Kelvin which runs through the grounds of Glasgow University on its way to Clyde, and Largs is the town on the Scottish Coast where Thomson built his house.

• Did you know Augustine Henry, who was of Ulster-Scot descent, discovered a rose which flowered all year round? more »

• Did you know a memorial was established many years ago in Portglenone Forest called Augustine Henry Grove? Augustine Henry was a famous Ulster-Scot. more »

• Did you know that, at the age of 17, Harry Ferguson had decided farming life was not for him? He thought of emigrating to Canada but his elder brother Joe asked him to come and work for him as an apprentice at his small car and cycle repair business in Little Donegal Street, Belfast.

• Did you know Ulster-Scot Harry Ferguson designed and built a new-style plough for the Ford Tractor in his May Street Garage in Belfast? Apart from its simplicity and lightness, the machine was unique in one important way - the tractor and plough formed a single unit. It was the birth of the unit system or \'Ferguson System\' which is now used on tractors all over the world.

• Did you know a full-scale replica of Harry Ferguson\\\'s aeroplane, an early Ferguson-Brown tractor, and a Sherman-Ferguson plough are on display in the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum at Cultra, County Down?

• Did you know that in August 1990, the Northern Bank issued a £20 note which featured the famous Ulster-Scot Harry Ferguson?

• Did you know the University of Ulster recently established the Harry Ferguson Engineering Village, within the Facility of Engineering, after the Ulster-Scot Harry Ferguson?

• Did you know the famous Ulsterman Frank Pantridge was born into the farming tradition on the outskirts of the Plantation Town of Hillsborough, County Down? Pantridge was famous for the development of the world\'s mobile defibrillator.

• Did you know there is a life-size bronze sculpture of the famous Ulsterman Professor Pantridge at Lagan Valley Island in Lisburn?

Geography

• Did you know only 12-13 miles of water separate the coasts of Ulster and Scotland? Since travel by water was easier than land, it is scarcely surprising that Ulster has been more closely linked with Scotland than the rest of the island of Ireland.

• Did you know the late sixth- and early seventh-century Kingdom of Dál Riata, corresponding approximately to modern counties of Argyll in Scotland and Antrim in Ulster, straddled the North Channel?

History

• Did you know Paschel Grousset, the French traveller and former Communard, wrote in the 1880s that he thought ‘Ulster is a neighbour to Scotland and belongs to the same geological, ethnological, commercial and religious system’?

• Did you know that while travelling around Ireland in 1796-7, just after Burns’s early death, the French Royalist émigré, the Chevalier de Latocnaye, concluded that ‘Belfast has almost entirely the look of a Scotch town, and the character of its inhabitants has considerable resemblance to that of the people of Glasgow’?

• Did you know that due to the efforts of Ulsterman William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), telegraph cable was laid on the seabed from Ireland to Canada, so that we could phone and make contact with each other? He was awarded a knighthood in November 1866 at the age of 42 for the success of the transatlantic cable project.

• Did you know that the famous Ulsterman William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) was born at 17 College Square East, Belfast on 26 June 1824? He is often regarded as the most important scientist of the Victorian age.

• Did you know that Robert Lloyd Praeger was a famous Ulster-Scot? He found weeds so fascinating that he published a book about them in 1913!

• Did you know Harry Ferguson, the famous Ulster-Scot, merged his company with Massey-Harris (a large firm in Toronto) to form Massey-Ferguson? Harry Ferguson was the Chairman of the company.

• Did you know the English historian G. M. Trevelyan (1876-1962) described the interaction between Ulster and Scotland as ‘a constant factor’ in history?

• Did you know Edward Bruce, the brother of Robert Bruce King of Scotland, arrived at Larne, County Antrim, on 26 May 1315? He arrived with a view to make himself King of Ireland. Edward Bruce was eventually defeated and killed at the Battle of Faughart on 14 October 1318.

• Did you know that from the 1390s the powerbase of the MacDonald Lords of the Isles straddled the North Channel? This was a result of the marriage of Ian Mor to Margery Bisset, heiress to the Glens of Antrim.

• Did you know that in 1606 Sir Hugh Montgomery, Laird of Braidstane in Ayrshire, and Sir James Hamilton, an adventurer and a don at Trinity College, Dublin, settled in North Down and the Ards with Lowland Scots in an unofficial plantation (the Montgomery and Hamilton settlement) which predated the Plantation of Ulster?

• Did you know the official Plantation of Ulster was facilitated by the departure of Hugh O’Neill and Hugh O’Donnell, the Earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnell respectively, who sailed from Lough Swilly for the Continent on 3-4 September 1607? This development, usually known as the ‘Flight of the Earls’, created a power vacuum and allowed the Crown to charge the Earls with high treason in their absence and to declare their lands forfeit.

• Did you know the Plantation of Ulster represented a U-turn in policy for the Government in London? Normally, policy had been directed at trying (in vain) to keep the Scots out of Ulster, rather than encouraging them to settle in Ulster.

• Did you know that the Scottish settlers came from Lanarkshire, Ayrshire, the Borders and the Lothians? more »

• Did you know that after the execution of King Charles I in January 1649, the Presbytery of Belfast published a document condemning the King’s ‘murder’ and other actions of the English Parliament? The Presbytery also declared their support for the Solemn League and Covenant drawn up by their Scottish co-religionists. On behalf of the English Parliament, John Milton, the Latin Secretary of the Commonwealth, responded by vigorously denouncing the ‘blockish presbyters of Clandeboye’ for their pains, and dismissed Belfast as ‘a barbarous nook’ and a place ‘whose obscurity till now never came to our hearing’.

• Did you know Oliver Cromwell gave orders in May 1653 that Ulster Presbyterians be deported to Kilkenny, Tipperary, and Waterford?

• Did you know that Archibald McIlroy, perhaps the foremost local exponent of the Kailyard school of writing, died as a result of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania? The RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine off the Old Head of Kinsale, close to Ireland, on 7 May 1915. McIlroy\'s most popular books include \'When Lint Was in the Bell\' (1897) and \'The Auld Meetin’-Hoose Green\' (1898).

• Did you know that in the course of the eighteenth century, 250,000 or more Ulster Scots left Ulster in search of a better life for themselves and their children in the New World? They left as a result of complex economic and religious reasons which are difficult to disentangle.

• Did you know the great Ulster-Scot exodus to the New World began in earnest when the Friends’ Goodwill sailed from Larne, County Antrim, for Boston, Massachusetts, in April 1717?

• Did you know philosopher Francis Hutcheson was born in Saintfield, County Down, and had Ulster-Scots connections? He is usually described as ‘the Father of the Scottish Enlightenment\', and his political thought was very influential in the American colonies. He also helped shape the thinking of the United Irishmen in their constitutional phase in the early 1790s. He was one of the first authors to challenge the legitimacy of slavery.

Innovation

• Did you know Sir Hans Sloane from Killyleagh in County Down was a famous Ulster-Scot who invented milk chocolate?

• Did you know Sloane Square, Sloane Street, Hans Place, and Hans Road in the centre of London were all named in honour of the famous Ulster-Scot Sir Hans Sloane who invented chocolate?

• Did you know inventor John Boyd Dunlop was a Scotsman who came to Ulster in the middle of the 19th Century?

• Did you know that Augustine Henry, who had Ulster-Scots connections, discovered the kiwi fruit? more »

• Did you know that Harry Ferguson was a famous Ulster-Scot who invented the first tractor that did not just tow implements like a horse, but had a special hydraulic system?

• Did you know Harry Ferguson, who is an Ulster-Scot and internationally recognised as one of the greatest inventors and innovators of the 20th Century, came from Growell in County Down?

• Did you know the famous Ulster-Scot Harry Ferguson invented the model using four-wheel drive for wide public use, and a device for preventing the locking of wheels in a skid?

• Did you know Sir James Martin, the famous Ulster-Scot from Crossgar in County Down, invented the ejection seat for aeroplanes?

• Did you know more than 7,000 lives have been saved using Martin-Baker (MB) Ejector Seat, which is now in use with more than 90 air forces and navies? Following its manufacture, the number of lives saved increased at an average of more than three a week. This is all thanks to the ejector seat which James Martin, the famous Ulster-Scot, invented.

• Did you know Frank Pantridge was the man who developed the mobile defibrillator and became known as the \\\\\\\'Father of emergency medicine\\\\\\\'?

Language

• Did you know that Lowlands Scots speech was introduced to Ulster around 1600? This was at a time when - according to Dr Caroline Macafee, editor of A Concise Ulster Dictionary (Oxford, 1996) - it displayed ‘the greatest differences from English’.

• Did you know Ulster-Scots literature also finds expression in the ‘Kailyard’ novel? The term is derived from the Scots ‘kailyaird’ or ‘kailyard’ which means the small cabbage patch (usually adjacent to a cottage). The narrative may be in Standard English but the dialogue is usually in Ulster-Scots. ‘Kailyard’ novels were frequently serialised in local newspapers, but are often criticised for presenting an overly sentimental representation of rural life.

Literature

• Did you know Ulster-Scots has its own literature? This includes the works of the eighteenth and nineteenth Century ‘rhyming weaver’ poets such as Hugh Porter, the Bard of Moneyslane; James Orr, the Bard of Ballycarry; Samuel Thomson, the Bard of Carngranny; and David Herbison, the Bard of Dunclug.

• Did you know there are three women poets who merit the ‘weaver poet’ description? The early nineteenth-century poet Sarah Leech, from Raphoe in East Donegal, was by far the most talented. The other two are Meggie White and Agnes Kerr. Meggie White’s Gane Afore and other poems was published in Belfast in 1885. Agnes Kerr’s Poems from Ahoghill was published around 1913.

• Did you know that the most successful and famous Kailyard novel is probably W. G. Lyttle’s Betsy Gray or Hearts of Down: A Tale of Ninety-Eight? Although a work of fiction, the book contains real historical figures and describes real events to such an extent that it is difficult to disentangle fact and fiction. Although often regarded as the definitive history of the events of June 1798 in County Down, it is not and was never intended to be.

Medicine

• Did you know Ulsterman Frank Pantridge introduced Belfast surgeons to the operation of mitral valvotomy in 1949? more »

Musical traditions

• Did you know the Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association (RSPBA) was founded in 1930 as a governing body to oversee pipe band competition and to promote and encourage the development of pipe band culture throughout the world? more »

• Did you know the Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band, formed in 1946, is the most successful pipe band ever to have emerged from Northern Ireland? more »

Presbyterianism

• Did you know Ballycarry is the oldest congregation in the Presbyterian Church in Ireland? Founded in 1613, it is situated in Templecorran parish, six miles north of Carrickfergus, County Antrim, and remains an area of strong Ulster-Scots settlement.

• Did you know the first regularly constituted Presbytery in Ireland was composed of chaplains drawn from Robert Monro’s Scottish army which met in Carrickfergus on 10 June 1642?

• Did you know that Ulster-Scot Reverend Francis Makemie (1658–1708) is usually regarded as the Father of American Presbyterianism? more »

• Did you know the Presbyterian Historical Society was founded in 1907 with the remit of promoting interest in, knowledge of, and understanding of, the history of the three Presbyterian traditions which exist in Ireland? These are the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland, and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland.

• Did you know Francis Alison, a Donegal-born Presbyterian minister, was a student of Francis Hutcheson? As a teacher, he played a crucial key role in transmitting Hutcheson’s political thought to the American colonies and in shaping opinion on American independence. more »

Science

• Did you know Joseph Black was a famous Ulster-Scot who first identified carbon dioxide in our air? more »

• Did you know James Murray was a famous Ulster-Scot who came from Culnady, County Londonderry, in 1788 and was the first person to discover how to dissolve magnesium carbonate into a liquid form? more »

• Did you know that the man who first described \\\"ozone\\\" (atmosphere) was Thomas Andrews from Ulster?

• Did you know Ulsterman William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) made the first scientific calculation of the age of the earth in 1846? more »

Sports

• Did you know it was the efforts of Harry Ferguson which led to the introduction of the Stormont Road Races Act of 1932? This made it possible for the first Ulster Grand Prix to take place.

Ulster-Scots and the United States

• Did you know the Belfast News Letter was the first newspaper in Europe to publish the text of the American Declaration of Independence in 1776?

• Did you know George Washington, the founding father of the United States, is alleged to have remarked: ‘If defeated everywhere else I will make my last stand for liberty among the Scotch-Irish [or Ulster-Scots] of my native Virginia’? At any given time, Ulster-Scots made up a high proportion of Washington’s forces: perhaps a third, and frequently a much higher percentage when less committed troops drifted off home.

• Did you know contrary to popular opinion, not all Ulster Scots supported the American Revolution? For example, Alexander Chesney from Dunclug, near Ballymena, emigrated with his parents and seven siblings to South Carolina. Although his younger brother was a rebel, during the Revolutionary War Alexander served as an officer in the loyalist militia. After the war he returned to Ireland and in 1798 he helped to suppress the United Irish rebellion.

Ulster-Scots Dance

• Did you know highland dancing is a very athletic form of dancing? It requires a massive amount of stamina and arm strength. Originally performed by men as a display before battle, today 95% of those who participate in highland dance are female.

• Did you know that Scottish Country Dancing is often regarded as a form of folk dancing? This is not entirely true as some Scottish Country dances have their origins in the courtly dances of the Renaissance.

• Did you know that there are different categories for Scottish Country dances? There are Reels (including hornpipes), Jigs, and Strathspeys, according to the type of music to which they are danced. The first two types (also called quick-time dances) feature fast tempos, quick movements and a lively feel. The third type (Strathspey) has a much slower tempo and a more formal, stately feel. There are also 9/8 jigs, minuets and waltz-time dances, although they make up a comparatively small part of the repertoire.

• Did you know Scottish Country dancing became popular in Ulster in the 1940s? more »