Highland Archive: Celebrated Highland journalist and academic’s papers reveal fascinating insights
Among the many hundreds of collections held at the Highland Archive Centre are the papers of Mary Beith: author, journalist and lecturer.
Mary Beith was born in London in May 1938 and, after leaving school, taught English in Germany before enrolling on a journalism course in Poole.
Mary was named Campaigning Journalist of the Year in 1975 for her undercover work in an animal testing laboratory and she also spent time undercover in Northern Ireland. She moved to the Highlands in the late 1980s, and made her home in Melness, Sutherland.
It was in Melness that Mary Beith started writing a fortnightly column for the West Highland Free Press. She had previously researched the history of herbal healing, and the use of traditional remedies in Highland (especially Gaelic) history and culture, and her regular column was based around this subject.
READ MORE: Highland Archive Centre map shows drove roads leading to Falkirk Tryst
She went on to become an expert in the field of herbal and traditional medicine and was often called upon to give advice and lectures at various events. Mary was interviewed many times about the subject of herbal healing, and within the Mary Beith collection at the Highland Archive Centre are several of her radio interviews, as well as many of her newspaper articles.
In addition to her regular newspaper column and other commitments, Mary also wrote a book entitled ‘Healing Threads, Traditional Medicines of the Highlands and Islands’, which was first published in 1995. Among her papers are notes for the book and illustrations to further explain the text.
Some of the diagrams in ‘Healing Threads’ depict methods used to aid or ‘cure’ various conditions in times gone by (including curing epilepsy by drinking the blood from one’s own left foot or protecting a newborn baby by circling it seven times while holding a piece of burning peat). Other illustrations show plants alongside information about how to use them (i.e. as a dressing, or in a drink) as well as what ailments or conditions they could soothe or cure. Some of the traditional remedies illustrated are still practised today, such as the use of a dock leaf on a nettle sting.
One of the other areas that Mary explored in her work was the influence that medicine and remedies from the Far and Middle East had on practises in the Highlands and Islands. She was interested in the extent to which the growth and ‘normalising’ of overseas travel opened the gateway for ideas, methods and ingredients to travel between countries and areas.
The Mary Beith collection, in addition to providing valuable collated information about the subject of traditional and herbal medicines for researchers of the present and future, also paints a picture of an expert who was highly thought of in both academic and alternative medicine circles.
Mary Beith was widely published in various media and corresponded with people from all walks of life. She died in 2012, leaving three adult children, and a wealth of information for future generations.