Bellingham has a rich Scottish heritage. In 1904 the city welcomed a noted band of Scottish musicians, the world-famous Canadian “Kilties.”
Scottish immigrants and their descendants formed organizations to keep the culture of Scotland alive in their new home. In the turn of the century this included the Scottish Society of Whatcom County, founded in 1906. Their goal was: “To knit Scotchmen and their descendants closer together, to enable members to assist, counsel and advise each other, to remind us of the heroic deeds of patriotic and eminent Scotchmen, and to keep their names and deeds ever fresh in our memories.” Their leader was called a “chief,” like the clan chiefs of old.
Another early group, the Royal Highlanders, was a fraternal insurance organization. Concentrated in the Midwest, they formed the Mount Chuckanut Castle chapter on Bellingham’s south side in 1907 and the Whatcom Castle on the north side in 1908.
An “illustrious protector” led each “castle.” Membership was open equally to men and women. Indeed, women served in leadership roles, including “chief archer.” Besides holding social events, the group conducted “ritual” ceremonies commemorating Scottish history and heroes such as Robert the Bruce and William Wallace.
Scottish Music in Bellingham
Traditional Scottish music and dance were an important part of these organizations. At meetings and Burns Night celebrations, they enjoyed performances by both guests and locals. The Highlanders even had a drill team of 24 young people that performed in plaids and kilts. “The strains of the old Scottish bagpipe rang out upon the stillness of the night,” the Bellingham Herald wrote about a Royal Highland concert in February, 1910, inspiring “every true Highlander, carrying them back in dreams of their old native country.”
Chuckanut Bay reminded many of Scotland’s famed Loch Lomond. Or so said members of the Scottish Society when they held a Fourth of July picnic and Highland Games on the shore in 1908, led in procession by “Piper [J.P.] McLeod.”
The Kilties are Coming!
Professional Scottish musicians were greeted with excitement. Perhaps the most famous Scottish band to visit Bellingham was the Kilties. Hailing from Belleville, Canada, they performed at Beck’s Theater on Saturday, February 13, 1904.
They were, it was claimed “the greatest band of its kind in the world.” Made up of veterans from the 48th Highlanders of Canada, or Gordon Highlanders, it was Canada’s most famous touring band. Playing everywhere from major cities to mining camps, they made a striking sight in their kilted uniforms.
The band consisted of 40 musicians, 10 soloists, 10 vocal choir members, six Highland dancers, two bagpipers, four British military buglers, and one very tall “giant drum major” named Donald MacCormack. Seven feet tall “in his stocking feet,” his hat added another foot and a half. “He is as good natured as he is big,” wrote the Bellingham Herald, “and is a thorough master of his art.”
Another part of the Kilties was the Clan Johnstone Troupe dancers and pipers from London’s Palace Theater. They were led by Albert Johnstone, then hailed by some as the “world’s first piping superstar.” Born in 1864 in Lochee to a blacksmithing family, Johnstone became a champion Highland dancer and master bagpiper. He played for Queen Victoria and even at the 1889 Paris World’s Fair, before joining the Kilties on their world tour. Cissie Grant was the principal female dancer.
Kilties Concert
“Canada’s crack military band” was now on a West Coast tour. “The Kilties are coming!” declared the Bellingham Herald. The concert, organizers promised, would be a “distinct novelty” and the matinee show would prove a “valuable educational feature” for children.
Seats in the balcony were 50 cents at the matinee, with seats on the lower floor 75 cents. Children could get in for a quarter to any part of theater. Tickets were first come, first served. The evening show tickets were 25, 50, 75 cents or a dollar, with $1.50 for box seats. Tickets to the evening show could be bought starting the day before at the box office or at Offerman’s Drug Store.
The Kilties “pleased two good sized audiences,” the Herald reported afterward. “The program was a varied one, embracing everything from ragtime to the classics. National dances and songs gave a pleasing variety to the program.”
There’s no surviving list of the Kilties’ local program, but their souvenir booklet, “Songs and Marches of ‘Auld Scotia,” gives an idea of what they typically played: regimental march of the Gordon Highlanders “The Cock O’The North,” “The Brae’s O’Mar,” “Scots Wha Hae,” “Loch Lomond,” “Jock O’Hazeldean,” “The Kilties March” by Albert Johnstone, “The British Grenadiers,” “The Maple Leaf,” “Pibroch of Donuil Dhu,” “The Campbells are Comin’,” “Annie Lauire,” and “Auld Lange Syne.”
The Kilties continued on their world tour after Bellingham, performing at the St. Louis World’s Fair before heading overseas to tour Great Britain and Europe. They even played for an appreciative King at Balmoral, the royal family’s Scottish castle. The Kilties returned to Bellingham in 1913, appearing as the “Royal Scotch Kilties” from Toronto with the Sells-Floto Circus on June 19.
A Scottish Legacy
Although its members came and went, the Kilties continued to perform internationally over the next few decades, visiting 20 countries on 16 world tours. The band disbanded in 1938, but members sometimes held reunions.
Although the Kilties’ Bellingham concert happened over a hundred years ago, Scottish heritage remains strong in Bellingham with events such as the annual Bellingham Scottish Gathering in Blaine and groups such as the Scottish Dance Society and Bellingham Pipe Band.
The Kilties would be proud.
