Tom Scott

TOM Scott, who has died aged 86, was the owner of Loch Lomond's biggest island, Inchmurrin, and became known as "King of the Loch".

He spent 80 years on the island but was also a record-breaking athlete as a young man before running his beloved Inchmurrin as a cattle and sheep farmer, salmon fisherman, rabbit-hunter, boatman, grouse shoot organiser, hotelier, restaurateur and one-man volunteer rescue team. He was honoured by the Scottish Parliament last year for saving more than 60 people from the loch during his lifetime.

He also rented out wooden cabins on 11 secluded acres of Inchmurrin to Scotland's oldest and most famous naturist colony, the Scottish Outdoor Club, and saw the current world haggis-hurling record – 180ft 10ins – set on the island in 1984.

"Big Tom" was an imposing figure, who built almost everything on the island with his own hands and was a man never swayed by the status of his visitors who all got the same treatment: a warm welcome with a smile that became increasingly toothless over the years, or undisguised contempt backed by colourful language and, if worst came to worst, a 12-bore shotgun as a "deterrent".

Thomas French Scott was born in Girvan, South Ayrshire, son of farmer David Scott and his wife Ellen. Young Tom was brought up on the family farm, Laggish in Barrhill, near Girvan, before his father bought Inchmurrin in 1932 for £1000. For several years now it has been part of the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park, something Mr Scott opposed (on the grounds of unnecessary bureaucracy) as he did the finer points of the law.

Many years ago, after a lucrative night netting loch salmon for his family and restaurant, he laid his nets out on a lawn to dry, where they were spotted by mainland police and impounded. "But these are my strawberry patch nets," he insisted before paying a 10-shilling fine to get them back.

Inchmurrin is visible across the loch from mainland tourist sites such as Lomond Shores, the Duck Bay Marina (built by younger brother Jay) and Cameron House hotel. It was historically used for deer hunting by the Earl of Lennox, King James VI and the Duke of Montrose, whose family owned it until the early 20th century. King Robert the Bruce planted yew trees on the island, Mary Queen of Scots dropped by, as did Rob Roy MacGregor to steal the island's cattle.

After the Scott family arrived there in 1932, young Tom and Jay went to Muirlands primary school in Arden on the "mainland", ferried to and fro by their father in a wooden dinghy. Rowing whenever the engine failed, they learned as infants how to navigate these difficult waters. (Tom's own sons continue to ferry their own children or grandchildren to and from the mainland 80 years later, where school buses take them to Luss primary or across the Black Hill to secondary school in Helensburgh. After Muirlands he attended the private Keil School in Dumbarton. When his father died of pneumonia after saving someone from then loch, the 16-year-old Tom Scott found himself running the island to support the family.

At the time, the family farm on Inchmurrin was rudimentary, with half a dozen cows, a bull and a flock of sheep. It now has around 80 head of cattle, a dozen mostly-holiday homes and the Naturist colony.

The brothers were serious all-round athletes from the late 1940s though the 1950s, competing initially at the Luss Highland Games. In addition to the traditional heavy events – wrestling, tossing the caber and putting the shot – Tom Scott also broke the Scottish triple jump record with a leap of 47ft 3ins at the Festival of Britain Clan Gathering in 1951. He and Jay, who married the well-known actress and singer Fay Lenore, were the finest all-round athletes in Scotland.

With his brother, and later with his two sons and his wife Anne, Mr Scott built holiday homes to supplement the farming income. Later came a hotel, restaurant and bar, which remains a favourite tourist location (though closed in winter).

Mr Scott initially supplemented the island's income by snaring and selling rabbits until the myxomatosis disease in the 1950s put rabbit off the menu in most homes. He later organised grouse and pheasant shoots.

He hated leaving his beloved island and rarely did, except to ferry guests to and fro or buy supplies. When friends showed up for his ruby wedding anniversary on the mainland in 1995, they found Anne alone with the rest of her family. He and Anne were delighted when their sons David and Dugald (who both helped out on the island) married two sisters, Dorothy and Morag Kirkpatrick, also from Bonhill, who had worked in the island restaurant.

After a caravan fire on the island in 1959, Mr and Mrs Scott adopted the surviving child of that fire, Douglas Campbell, who became a dear son to them, and brother to David and Dugald.

Tom Scott died in the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley. He is survived by his wife Anne (née Hall), sons David and Dugald, daughters-in-law Dorothy (Dot) and Morag, and grandchildren Tom, Ellie, Isla, Hamish, Shona, Iona and Janie. His adopted son Douglas died in 2001, his brother Jay in 1997.