IT was very good to read Hugh Boyd's letter (April 22) about Dugald Semple.
The comparison with John Muir is well made: Semple worked as a journalist for much of his life, publishing in various newspapers in Renfrewshire, Ayrshire and Glasgow, often accompanying his columns about the natural world with his own photographs.
He was also known as the Scottish Thoreau, after Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), the New England essayist, and shared his philosophical interests. Semple was also a conscientious objector in 1916, a pioneering vegetarian and - closer to home - an acquaintance of Roland Muirhead (1868-1964) of Lochwinnoch.
His "simple life" colony outside Beith between the wars anticipated the "downshifting" movement of our own day. Mr Boyd is right to say that Semple deserves to be far better known. I am currently researching his life and work and would be pleased to hear from anyone who remembers him or who is interested in his various contributions to Scottish and international affairs.
Dr Steven Sutcliffe,
University of Edinburgh,
New College, Mound Place, Edinburgh.
I HAD the good fortune and the pleasure to have spent many hours with Dugald Semple at his old cottage in Fairlie.
I was born in Glasgow 1940, and as a working class family we were very privileged to have a small family cottage next to Dugald Semple , just below Farlie High Station.
I spent every spare weekend and all summers at Fairlie until I was 22.
He inspired and encouraged me in my interests of painting, mountaineering and growing organic vegetables. From Dugald I learned the magic of growing Ayrshire potatoes in seaweed (sadl, I think a thing of the past, at least, on a commercial level).
As a young man I was saddened by the attacks on Dugald from many quarters. As Hugh Boiyd says, he was indeed "another Scot disregarded".
I remember him telling me that he was often called a crank in the press, and to his face. With a wry smile he reminded me that the crank was the central and most important part of any machine.
I agree with Mr Boyd. The Dugald Semple antidote to the hectic, materialistic lifestyle of today is even more relevant.
Graham Noble,
N0 2 Drumsallie Cottages. Kinlocheil, Fort William.
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