I imagine the first question anyone will ask is what is a column called "Scottish Flotsam". I guess we will have to begin with what is "flotsam". Among the definitions of the word are "things washed ashore" or "miscellaneous trifles". Well, we believe you can find some great treasure on the ocean shore. But -- you will never know what you will find or its value. So we decided that is what this column is - flotsam. We wanted a place to put things that didn't fit anywhere else and might be of interest. Each item could be a column itself and might be some day but for now it will be the flotsam, which washes our way.

John Logie Baird, (1888-1946). Baird was born at Helensburgh, Dumbartonshire, the son of a local minister. He studied electrical engineering at the Royal Technical College and then went to the University of Glasgow, where the start of World War I interrupted his studies. He was never very fit and was turned down for military service on health grounds, spending most of the war as superintendent engineer of the Clyde Valley Electrical Power Company - a pioneer of electrical generation and power transmission in Scotland. After the war he tried a variety of business enterprises but was forced to abandon them due to his recurring ill health. In 1922 he moved to Hastings.

Baird then began his scientific research on television, his laboratory an attic and his equipment odd pieces of junk, including a tea chest, biscuit tin, pieces of cardboard, darning needles, string and sealing wax. By 1924 he had transmitted the image of a Maltese cross over several feet. Moving to attic rooms in London's Soho he continued his experiments, despite ill health and virtual poverty. In 1926 he made his breakthrough and was able to give a demonstration of his system to a group of fifty scientists.

Thereafter events moved rapidly and 1927 saw a television demonstration over telephone lines linking London and Glasgow, and the foundation of the Baird Television Development Company and the Television Society, of which Baird became a fellow. in 1928 the first transatlantic TV pictures were successfully transmitted and the same year Baird gave the first demonstration of colour TV

An experimental TV service was inaugurated by the BBC in 1929 and Baird himself continued to be associated with many of the early developments in outside broadcasting during the early thirties. In 1935 the Selsdon Committee recommended that the BBC should produce the programmes for a full-scale, regular, public TV service - as was already provided by radio. The Baird system, using 240 lines, was to be used alongside the all-electronic Marconi-EMI system, which transmitted on 405 lines. The BBC used both systems until 1937 when Baird's was ultimately dropped.

Baird's company continued to manufacture TV sets on the electronic system, but he apparently took little interest. Becoming increasingly disillusioned he retreated into top secret war and other experimental work. He died in 1946.

Another famous Scot involved in Broadcasting

John Reith, Lord Reith (1889-1971). Like John Logie Baird (1886-1946) Reith was a distinguished pioneer of broadcasting, though in a management rather than an inventive capacity. Reith was a son of the manse, born at Stonehaven, where his father was the Free Church Minister. He was educated at the Glasgow Academy, Gresham's School, Norfolk, and the Royal Technical College, Glasgow, before taking an apprenticeship with the North British Locomotive Company in 1908. In 1914 he worked on the extension of the Royal Dock in London. He joined the 5th Scottish Rifles on the outbreak of World War I and spent nearly a year in France before being wounded at the battle of Loos in October 1915, when a sniper's hulled gashed his face. Back home, he worked in the Ministry of Munitions, including an eighteen-month spell in the United States, negotiating contracts for munitions.

After the war Reith was at something of a loose end and toyed with the idea of entering Parliament, either representing the Liberals or Labour. He worked for a while as general manager of Beardmore's Coatbridge plant, but thereafter moved to London. When the post of general manager of the British Broadcasting Company was advertised he applied and was appointed in December 1922. For the next four years he masterminded the development of commercial broadcasting and then when the British Broadcasting Corporation received its royal charter in 1926 of public service broadcasting. This was no easy task given both the prejudice against it and the lack of precedents for Reith violently eschewed the American experience of sponsored commercial radio. Reith was determined to create an efficient national service, setting a high moral and educational tone. His dogmatism and determination paid off even in the face of considerable political criticism, for example at the time of the General Strike in 1926. Ten years later in 1936 he inaugurated television.

By 1938 Reith was apparently bored at the BBC and left to become Chairman of Imperial Airways, and later in 1939 held a similar post at the British Overseas Airways Corporation. With the outbreak of World War II, Reith held a succession of ministerial posts - information, transport and works. Churchill (1874 -1965) added planning and a peerage to this last post in 1942, but Reith found it difficult to work with politicians and his career in government ended with his early dismissal. He spent the rest of the war working at the Admiralty and helped mastermind the D-Day landings.

Although he bitterly regretted his move from the BBC and continued to crave high office Reith's subsequent public service was considerable, chairing such bodies as the Commonwealth Telecommunications Board, the New Towns Committee, the National Film Finance Corporation and the Colonial Development Corporation. One of his last public appointments was as Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1967 - 8 - a post to which he brought both great physical stature and the high moral values he had sought to impose on others throughout his earlier career. Yet Reith was a man of vision and dynamism - undoubtedly one of the most gifted Scots of his generation.

The Reith Diaries were published in 1975.

Now lets look at some Scottish happenings this month:

1536 - September 1
James V set off from Kirkcaldy for France with a squadron of five ships - his mission to look for a bride.

1745 - September 5
Army of Bonnie Prince Charlie was established in Perth as the Prince finalised plans to hold court in Holyrood.

1985 - September 10
Scotland football manager, Jock Stein collapsed and died in Ninian Park, Cardiff, minutes after his team qualified for the World Cup finals.

1290 - September 26
Margaret, 'Maid of Norway' and granddaughter of Alexander III, and the acknowledged heir to the throne of Scotland, died in Orkney, en route to her home.

Source - Scotching the Myths by Jim Hewiston can be found in the History Book Section of Scottish Radiance.

It is time to stop combing the library but we can not quit without some quotes from Quotable Scots another great History bookshelf resident. Let's see what quotes we can find.

As ever Scots knows, a gallus besom is a cheeky bitch
Muriel Gray correcting a London television company which had translated 'gallus besom' as a lively lass'

It's a very street word and we mean it in the most modern sense. It means to be cool. Benny Lynch personifies that. He came from a humble background yet he conquered the world.
Mark Rankin of pop band Gun, on why they feature Benny Lynch on the cover of their album, Gallus, 1992

gallus - an instantly available Scottish word, still used, and meaning 'deserving the gallows'.
W.Gordon Smith writer

It's a blend that's a hit with all ages, from gyrating teenagers to gallus grannies.
James McBeth writer of Runrig

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