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Island of Stroma

Stroma is an uninhabited island in the Pentland Firth, between Orkney and the mainland of Scotland. It forms part of the civil parish of Canisbay in Caithness, in the council area of Highland. The name comes from the Old Norse Straumey, meaning "island in the current".

Ancient stone structures testify to the presence of Stroma's earliest residents, while a Norse presence around 900–1,000 years ago is recorded in the Orkneyinga Saga. It has been politically united with Caithness since at least the 15th century. Although Stroma lies only a few miles off the Scottish coast, the savage weather and ferociously strong tides of the Pentland Firth meant that the island's inhabitants were very isolated, causing them to be largely self-sufficient, trading agricultural produce and fish with the mainlanders.

Most of the islanders were fishermen and crofters; some also worked as maritime pilots to guide vessels through the treacherous waters of the Pentland Firth. The tides and currents meant that shipwrecks were frequent—the most recent occurring in 1993—and salvage provided an additional though often illegal supplement to the islanders' incomes. A lighthouse was built on Stroma in 1890 and still operates under automation.

Stroma is now abandoned, with the houses of its former inhabitants unoccupied and falling into ruin. Its population fell gradually through the first half of the 20th century as inhabitants drifted away to seek opportunities elsewhere, as economic problems and Stroma's isolation made life on the island increasingly unsupportable. From an all-time peak of 375 people in 1901, the population fell to just 12 by 1961 and the last islanders left at the end of the following year. Stroma's final abandonment came in 1997 when the lighthouse keepers and their families departed. The island is now owned by one of its former inhabitants, who uses it to graze sheep.

Geography, geology, flora and fauna
Stroma is located in the Pentland Firth about 2 mi northwest of John o' Groats on the mainland. The island divides the firth into two channels, the Inner Sound to the south and the Outer Sound to the north. It is mostly low-lying and flat, covering an area of around 375 ha and rising to a height of 53 m at Cairn Hill in the southeast. It is oriented in a north-south direction, measuring about 2 mi long by 1 mi wide.

The island is ringed by cliffs that vary in height from around 33 m on the west coast to low cliffs with a narrow rocky foreshore elsewhere. The eastern side of the island slopes downward in an easterly or southeasterly direction, with the angle of the slope increasing from around 3 degrees in the centre of the island to about 30 degrees on the east coast. The bedrock of the island consists of flat layers of weathered Middle Old Red Sandstone, known as Rousay flags. A six-foot band of the fine-grained stone used to be quarried on a small scale for use on the mainland as roofing material. It is similar in composition to the Mey Beds on the mainland, though in some places on Stroma it is replaced by beds of angular and rounded masses of sandstone in a nodular matrix, similar to the Ackergill Beds in Caithness. Only fragmentary fossil remains have been found; these include specimens of the extinct Devonian fish Dipterus and Coccosteus.

Stroma is bisected by a fault which runs in a north-south direction through its centre, intersected by another fault running in an east-northeast direction across the north of the island. The soil on either side of the fault line is significantly different; the eastern and southern parts of Stroma are covered by fertile clay fed by bedrock minerals, while less fertile boggy ground predominates on the west side.

The heavily indented coastline has a circumference of about 7 mi, punctuated by numerous geos or inlets created by the waves eroding the sea cliffs along fault lines. A partially collapsed sea cave called The Gloup is located in the northwest of the island. This feature is a deep rocky pit, filled with sea water. It is located at the junction of the two fault lines and is connected to the sea by a subterranean passage 165 yd long, created by erosion along the east-northeast fault. The passage is said to have been used for smuggling; the islanders reportedly concealed illegal distilling from HM Customs and Excise by hiding the stills and alcohol in a cave within The Gloup, called "the Malt Barn", which was only accessible at low tide.

The flora and fauna of Stroma are similar to those of the mainland. The island is treeless; its vegetation consists primarily of grasses, heather and small flowers. Seals are plentiful along its shores and are sometimes found inland during the breeding season. Both grey seals and harbour seals are present, with around 650 grey seal pups being born each year. Otters may also be present, as in other parts of mainland Caithness. The western cliffs are the site of colonies of terns, guillemots, fulmars and eider ducks. The cliffs are designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest within the North Caithness Cliffs Special Protection Area. The waters off Stroma support a number of cetacean species including minke whale, white-beaked dolphin and harbour porpoise.

Demographics
Two settlements existed on Stroma: Nethertown, in the north of the island, and Uppertown or Overtown, in the south. They originally belonged to the Freswick estate, which owned Nethertown, and the Mey estate, which owned Uppertown. Between the two was Mains of Stroma, the island's principal farm. A track runs the entire length of the island, connecting the lighthouse at the north tip with the two settlements and the harbour on the south coast.

The island is now uninhabited; the last resident islanders left in 1962 and the very last inhabitants, the keepers of the island lighthouse and their families, left in 1997 when the lighthouse was automated. The population reached a peak of 375 in 1901 but censuses conducted between 1841 and 1961 tell the story of the collapse of Stroma's population during the 20th century:

Prehistoric settlement and remains
Stroma was inhabited in prehistoric times, as demonstrated by the presence of a number of ancient stone structures around the island. A ruined chambered cairn is situated at the far north end of the island near the lighthouse. It has been partially excavated and measures some 16 m in diameter by 1.8 m high. The 18th century inhabitants of the island collected the prehistoric stone arrowheads that they found on the western side of the island, believing them to be "elf-shot", and regarded them as having been made by fairies. They believed that if they possessed an "elf-shot" they would be granted protection for themselves and their cattle from any harm caused by the fairies.

Structures similar to cists, which the islanders called "Picts' Beds", are also found on the island. Notable examples can be seen in the north near Nethertown. They are usually located near middens, out of which animal bones and shells are eroding. Little appears to be known about the purpose and origins of these structures. Although the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland attributes them to prehistory, it is also possible that they are Norse in origin. A kidney-shaped burnt mound located near Castle Geo in the south-east of Stroma can be more confidently ascribed to prehistory. It consists of an accumulation of cracked and scorched stones that were used to heat water in a communal cooking trough. Although the example on Stroma has not been dated, burnt mounds found elsewhere on Orkney and Shetland have been dated to the Bronze Age and the early Iron Age.

The remains of an earth-and-stone fort are situated on the promontory of Bught o' Camm on the west coast of Stroma, near the north end of the island, though its origins are unknown. A rampart standing 1 m with an average spread of 6 m encloses an area of some 70 by and blocks off access to the promontory. There is no evidence of structures inside the fort's perimeter. It may possibly have been entered from the east end of the rampart, where a 3 m gap exists, but this may alternatively have been produced by natural processes.

Medieval period
The first historical record of the island is found in the 12th century Orkneyinga Saga. It records that a man named Valthiof, the son of Olaf Rolfson, lived and farmed on Stroma. One Yule Eve, he set off in a ten-oar boat to Orphir on Mainland, Orkney at the invitation of the Earl of Orkney, Paul Haakonsson. However, the boat was lost with all hands, as the Saga puts it: "sad news as Valthiof was a most accomplished man". The Earl later granted Valthiof's farm to Thorkel Flettir. Later, a rowdy Viking named Sweyn Asleifsson fled to Stroma, pursued by Earl Harald Haakonsson. The two men were trapped on the island due to bad weather but were persuaded to make peace by a mutual friend named Asmundi, who insisted that Sweyn and Harald should share the same bed.

The Norse are also believed to have built a fortification, now called Castle Mestag, at Mell Head in the far south-west of Stroma. The structure (also known as "the Robber's Castle") is situated on the top of an isolated rock stack some 4.5 m from the cliffs of the main island. The islanders believed that it had once been connected by a drawbridge or some other kind of artificial span, or alternatively it may once have been accessible via a rock arch that has since collapsed.

Due to its proximity to the Scottish mainland, Stroma has long been politically united with Caithness. An old story tells that possession of the island was once disputed between the Earls of Orkney and Caithness. To resolve the dispute, they relied on a legend that venomous animals would thrive in Caithness but die in Orkney. Some venomous snakes were duly imported to Stroma and survived there, "proving" that the island did belong to Caithness and not Orkney.

It is more reliably recorded that in 1455 the Bishop of Caithness, William Mudy, granted Stroma and other lands and castles to his brother Gilbert. It eventually passed into the hands of the Sinclair family, who have held the title of Earl of Caithness since 1455. In 1659 George Sinclair, the 6th Earl of Caithness, granted the wadset of Stroma to John Kennedy of Kermuck, who had fled to the far north after being outlawed following the fatal wounding of John Forbes of Watertown.

115 years later, the Rev. George Low recorded in his account of a tour of the island that he had seen "the remains of a pretty large house and gardens, once possessed by a gentleman, the proprietor of the island, who being forced to fly his native home on account of a duel, chose this for his retreat". The gardens were said to have been furnished with "plants that cured every disease". Nothing is now left of the house, but the gardens may have been located within a walled enclosure near the Nethertown pier.

Life on Stroma: 17th and 18th centuries
Life on the island was very isolated due to its inaccessibility. Until as late as 1894 it had no landing place, which meant that boats had to be landed directly on the beach and pulled up above the waterline. Particularly in winter, when storms raged through the Pentland Firth, Stroma could be cut off for weeks at a time. Such episodes posed serious risks to the islanders, as they had no doctor. The winter of 1937 illustrated the problems that the weather could pose; during January and February that year, the island was cut off for three weeks by violent gales which demolished houses along the seafront and washed boats 100 yards (90 m) inland. Stroma's isolation came at an especially bad time, as most of the population had caught influenza and supplies of food dwindled to the point that some items had to be rationed. Eventually two boats were able to reach the island, carrying supplies and a doctor from Caithness, along with three weeks' worth of mail.

Two chapels were established on Stroma at some point prior to the 17th century; they were known as the Kirk of Stara (from the Norse name for "big church") and the Kirk of Old Skoil (from Skali, possibly a name given to a farm). Their locations are now unknown, but the Kirk of Old Skoil may have been located in the far south-east of Stroma where the island's graveyard is now. They both fell into disuse by the mid-17th century and, lacking a church of their own, it was perhaps not surprising that the islanders were felt by mainlanders to be somewhat lacking in religious commitment. An inquiry by the Canisbay Kirk in the 17th century rebuked them for visiting "Popish" chapels on the mainland, profaning the Lord's Day, being "ale sellers and drinkers" and playing football and dancing on the Sabbath. The Presbytery decided that the inhabitants were spiritually neglected "by reason of the dangerous passage to that place, especially in winter." The minister of Canisbay was supposed to preach four times a year on Stroma but was reprimanded for only doing so twice yearly. The islanders were instructed to attend church at Canisbay and a kirk session ordained in 1654 that they should be given free passage and that any Stroma person with a boat who stayed away should be fined.

The island's population numbered a few dozen families throughout the 18th century, corresponding to a population of no more than a couple of hundred people; it was recorded as numbering 30 families in 1710, 47 in 1724, 40 in 1735 and 30 in 1760. They rented their land from two branches of the Sinclair family, the Sinclairs of Mey who owned Uppertown and the Sinclairs of Freswick who owned Nethertown. The latter acquired Nethertown in 1721 and eventually took possession of Uppertown as well by obtaining the wadset from the Kennedys, reportedly through skullduggery. According to the deathbed confession of one of the witnesses to the transaction, the laird, Sinclair of Freswick, obtained the "assent" of the deceased Kennedy holder of the wadset by placing a quill in the dead man's hand and moving it to make the corpse write its name on the document. The other witness committed suicide, perhaps out of guilt. The island was reasonably profitable for the Sinclairs; in 1724 the islanders paid an annual rent of 1,300 marks (equivalent to about £125 at 2011 prices), part of which was paid in surplus grain ferried by Stroma's boats to the Sinclair granaries at Staxigoe near Wick. They were self-sufficient in dairy produce and were known for the quality of their cheese-making; Daniel Defoe thought Stroma cheese was excellent.

19th and 20th centuries
By the early 19th century, around 30 families numbering 170 people lived on Stroma, farming land allocated on the traditional run rig system. The island was said to be "very productive in corn", though the inhabitants did not make use of ploughs; instead, they dug high beds or ridges, which produced greater yields than ploughing would have. George Low wrote in his 1774 account of the island that "the soil is good, black and deep, thrown up into high ridges by the spade, in a word the whole cultivated part of the Island is dressed like a garden and produces far greater crops than are common on plowed ground." Agricultural life on the island followed a fairly typical crofting pattern, with the average Stroma croft being about 10 acre in size. Families usually kept a few cows, sheep and hens, along with a single horse and pig. They grew a variety of crops such as oats, potatoes, hay and turnips, obtained water from wells and used horses to meet their transportation needs. As well as agricultural exports, they also exported flagstones from the island and imported peat to burn as fuel; they were dismissive of the practice in some of the Orkney Islands of using cow dung as fuel, referring to the northern island of Sanday as "the little island where the coos shit fire". Low observed the effect of the island's climate on the inhabitants: "The men are stout hardy spadesmen as was said before, the women while young are tolerably well looked, but as they advance in age grow very hard favoured, acquiring a peculiar ghastliness in their countenances contrary to what is observed of the women in Orkney."

The islanders also supported themselves through fishing, exploiting the high-quality catches that were to be made around the island's coasts. James Traill Calder wrote in his 1861 Sketch of the Civil and Traditional History of Caithness that "The finest cod in the north is to be got in the Pentland Firth ... Large and excellent lobsters are caught around the island [of Stroma]." It was said that the cod had "the firmest white flesh of any caught from British waters due to having to continuously swim in strong currents." As well as trapping lobsters, the islanders practised hand line cod fishing in the waters of the Firth. This involved towing lengths of line with heavy weights and a metal rod or sprool at one end, from which hung a short length of hemp and hook baited with limpets. To encourage the fish to bite, the boats had to be held still by their rowers, which required great skill in the Firth's unpredictable currents. The island was noted for its native type of boat, the Stroma yole, which was a direct descendant of the old Norse longship.

Many of the male islanders utilised their knowledge of the Firth's currents to hire themselves out to passing vessels as maritime pilots. Their expertise was the product of a lifetime's experience on the waters of the Firth; as it was said, they had been "dabbling in salt water from their childhood upwards". Indeed, the whole island was drenched in salt water thrown up by the powerful tides and storms to which it was subjected, particularly in the winter. The Statistical Account of Scotland noted that during a storm the sea level on the west of the island was more than 2 fathom higher than on the east side, and that the spray was thrown so high that it washed over the cliff tops "and falls in such profusion as to run in rills to the opposite shore". The islanders took advantage of this phenomenon by capturing the water in a reservoir to power a watermill which ground their grain in the winter months. It is not now known exactly where the mill was or what happened to it. Although it is described in the Statistical Account, written in the 1790s, and a Robert Miller is listed in the 1851 census as its miller, by 1861 he had moved to farm a 5 acre croft and no further mention is made of the mill in contemporary accounts.

Stroma's violent storms occasionally wrought destruction on the island. In December 1862, a great storm broke over the island with such force that it swept right across the northern end of Stroma, leaving wreckage, rocks and seaweed on the top of the 100-foot-high cliffs and destroying the channels leading to the watermill. However, the sea's destructive power had one positive benefit for the islanders, if not for those caught out by the currents and shoals of the Pentland Firth. Over the last two hundred years, over sixty vessels ranging from fishing boats to large cargo vessels have been wrecked on the shores of Stroma, with many more vessels coming to grief on the reefs and shoals of the neighbouring mainland and Orkney coasts. Many vessels – at least 560 between 1830 and 1990 – have had to be refloated in the Pentland Firth after getting into difficulties. Shipwrecks were a valuable source of income, timber and goods for the islanders, who would salvage liberally – and often with little regard for legality – whenever a stranded ship was abandoned. The building of Stroma's first lighthouse in the late 19th century was initially opposed by some of the islanders who were more concerned with profiting from shipwrecks than preventing them.

The shipwrecks continued, nonetheless, with one of the most profitable of all being the 1931 wreck of the 6,000-ton Danish freighter Pennsylvania on the neighbouring island of Swona. The vessel was plundered by the inhabitants of Stroma, Swona and South Ronaldsay. Much of her cargo of slot machines, spark plugs, clothing, tobacco, watches and car parts was looted and concealed in haystacks, oatfields, lochs and caves. David Stogdon, a lifeboatman, recalled seeing what the islanders did with their illicit salvage: "Every house was stuffed with wreck [salvage] ... clocks, telescopes, binnacles ... I seem to remember enormous dining-room tables in small cottages. And then of course from time to time they'd have cargo parts of lorries or something like that which could be put together to make a lorry and taken ashore on two or three fishing boats in calm weather. They'd land it quietly somewhere, drive it along and sell it." Customs officers, policemen, coastguards and Receivers of Wreck were not generally welcome – the island had no police force – and the islanders let it be understood that unfortunate things could happen to the boats of unwanted visitors: "Police boats could go missing, develop an unexpected leak or spontaneously combust." The area still presents hazards to passing ships; in January 1993, the Danish coaster Bettina Danica ran aground off the southern end of Stroma. The wreck was broken apart by the action of the sea in 1997 and only her stern section is still visible.

Another way the islanders supported themselves was through the illicit brewing of spirits as a way of boosting their income – a common practice among the older people. An inspector who visited the island's school in 1824 described the inhabitants of Stroma as "all professed smugglers". The suppression of smuggling by the authorities led to a significant drop in the island's population the first half of the 19th century. The census of 1841 noted: "now smuggling being completely suppressed, several families have left the island and removed to the Orkneys to follow more lawful pursuits." While smuggling may have been tackled, illicit distilling continued for many years. One former inhabitant, Mrs. David Gunn, recalled in 1971 how her great-grandmother had managed to avoid the "excisemen" (customs officers) confiscating her illegally brewed alcohol:

"My great-granny, a woman Kirsty Banks frae Stroma – she wesna supposed to be very clever, but faith! She hed all her wits boot her. They used to dae a bit о distillin in that time, on their own of coorse, and wan time they hed a browst ready, fan they heird 'at 'e excisemen were comin. Noo she'd hedden a stillborn bairn no long afore 'at, an 'e excisemen kent 'at. And they'd no time til hide 'e malt. So she telt 'e bairns til make up a bed til her in 'e kitchen, and til put 'e malt in 'e bed, and she wes lyin on 'at fan 'e excisemen came in. And she telt them 'at she'd hidden a stillborn bairn no long afore 'at, and she wisna feelin very weil, but 'e bairns wanted her in 'e kitchen, til guide them and tell them fat til do. And 'e excisemen kent that was true, they kent she'd hedden a bairn. So they searched 'e rest о the hoose, but they didna touch 'e bed, and they got off wi' it."

Despite their physical isolation, the islanders maintained a lively community. A school had been established in 1723 by the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge (SSPCK), with sixty children on its initial attendance roll. The demands of island life conflicted to some extent with those of schooling. The SPCK's inspector found only eighteen out of seventy pupils present when he visited in 1824. He found that many of the children were fully occupied helping their families in summer and only attended school in winter. Two places of worship were built within a couple of years of each other, a Baptist chapel in 1877 and a Church of Scotland church in 1878 (at a cost of £900). Although they soon became focal elements of community life, there seems to have been some bad blood between the two congregations, perhaps due to a clash between the missionary zeal of local Baptists and the Calvinism of the Presbyterian Kirk.

The inhabitants of Stroma were highly self-sufficient, and many practiced additional trades such as carpentry or roof-laying in addition to their "day jobs" in fishing or crofting. They built their own houses and boats, produced most of their own food, maintained farm equipment, shod their own horses, and made their own clothes, boots and shoes. In the 1920s they built their own wind turbines to recharge the batteries of their radio sets. By the end of the 19th century the island had three shops including a grocery. Any additional needs were met by purchasing supplies from shops at Wick and Thurso on the mainland or by mail-order from catalogues. For a while, they were also able to use the services of a floating shop which came periodically from Orkney to Stroma. Customers were rowed out to buy groceries, flour, animal feed, paraffin and clothes in exchange for lobsters, wet salted fish and eggs.

Most of the houses on Stroma are single-storey stone-built structures with two main rooms (a "butt" and a "ben") plus a closet (a small bedroom) and a porch. The rooms were small and simply furnished, incorporating recessed box beds. These consisted of a series of wooden planks with a layer of straw on top, on which was placed a chaff-filled mattress. The butt was used as a living room and included an iron stove with an oven, and sometimes a water tank to enable hot water to be generated, while the ben was used for visitors and as a sitting-room.

One former islander, Jimmy Simpson, recalled that "we had about two hundred and fifty folks here when I was a boy. It never seemed a lonely place. There were always people going in and out of each other's houses, there were forty children at the school and there were two teachers. We had concerts; three concerts in the winter when you had to sing loud to get above the sound of the wind. The young people would meet at the shop in the long, long evenings in summer." The island had some distinctively eccentric characters: Donald Banks, the island's coffin-maker, was known for quarrelling with his neighbours (telling one family, "I'll no bury any more o' ye!" ) and combining poetry with coffin-making, as in the order he placed with a mainland supplier:

Dear Mr. Sutherland,

Would you be so good,

To send eight planks of coffin wood.

Half inch lining, (dear Mr. Sutherland,)

For those who are pining ...

Describing life on Stroma, Simpson commented:

"There would be about fifty houses or crofts, small crofts, but they were reckoned to be better off than the fisherman in, say, Wick or Keiss. They set the croft down before they went off on the herring fishing – the herring was a big industry in that days. When the men went to the herring fishing, they had the croft ploughed; the women fed the sheep and the cattle and milked the cow, and when they came home from the fishing they had tatties for the winter feed and then they cut their harvest. When the herring fishing was finished, it was harvest time — it was a seasonal fishing, and it suited the Stroma men perfectly because their wives attended to the crofts. You could say the women in Stroma were liberated well before women's lib. They'd got men's work to do – milk cows, make butter; they were very industrious women. And then when the husband comes home they'd have a fat pig to kill – that was your winter meat, all salted."

Decline and abandonment
Stroma's population fell precipitously through the first half of the 20th century, leading eventually to the island's final abandonment at the end of the 1950s. There was no single cause that precipitated the collapse of Stroma's population. Living conditions on the island were always basic; there was no running water or electricity, and gas only arrived in the 1950s, which contrasted poorly with the improvements being made on the mainland. The fishing deteriorated after the First World War, and crofting became an increasingly difficult way to make a living. The island was relatively overpopulated; by 1901 the population was nearly twice that of sixty years previously, and there was little spare land left for farming. Families of six to eight children were common, but there was simply not enough work for all, so the eldest often left for the mainland or emigrated to Canada or the United States to find work. The lack of a proper harbour meant that the islanders could not make use of larger boats or develop a modern fishery. Young people started moving away to seek better-paying opportunities elsewhere, eventually followed by their parents.

Both of the World Wars had a major impact on Stroma, which was only 12 mi from the Royal Navy's chief base at Scapa Flow in Orkney. Six islanders died in each of the World Wars; the names of all twelve are inscribed on the island's war memorial, and during the Second World War as much as a quarter of the population was on war service. Adding to the island's economic problems, the introduction of the 11-plus exam in 1944 meant that all children over the age of 12 had to leave Stroma to complete their education at the secondary school in Wick. Because they could not commute between the island and Wick, they had to attend school as boarders, which incurred additional expenses for their parents.

Two other factors have often been cited in Stroma's depopulation: the building of the nuclear power station at nearby Dounreay in the 1950s, which created many new jobs on the mainland, and in the same decade the construction of a harbour on Stroma on which many islanders were employed. Although it has been claimed that this gave the islanders the incentive (and the means) to leave, local historian Donald A. Young points out that of islanders who left after 1945, only one went directly from Stroma to Dounreay. Most of the rest either continued fishing or carried on crofting on the mainland, while others found alternative jobs. Some ex-islanders eventually found jobs at Dounreay, but they had already moved to the mainland for work or education.

The Sinclairs of Mey sold their portion of the island to Colonel F. B. Imbert-Terry in 1929, who sold it in turn to John Hoyland, an umbrella manufacturer from Yorkshire, in 1947. Hoyland also acquired the remaining island estate of the Sinclairs of Freswick, uniting Stroma for a reported cost of £4,000. His tenure coincided with the final collapse of the island's population. As the tenants left, Hoyland put Stroma on the market but found no buyers. A Caithness councilman suggested various schemes for Stroma, including establishing a naturist resort and using it as a site for a crematorium, but the council rejected suggestions that it should take on responsibility for the island. As the population left, the local economy disintegrated; there were no longer enough able-bodied men to man the fishing boats, and the remaining facilities on the island were closed down for lack of custom. The last store on the island, the Scottish Cooperative Wholesale Society shop, closed in 1956. Only three families, numbering 16 people in total, were left by 1957; that year, the island's school closed, by which time it only had two pupils. The Post Office closed in 1958 when the family which operated it left for the mainland.

In the summer of 1958, Hoyland prompted controversy by offering the island to the American TV quiz show Bid 'n' Buy as a prize. After an outcry on both sides of the Atlantic, the show's producers settled for offering a car instead. In December 1960, he sold Stroma to Jimmy Simpson, an islander whose family had moved to farm on the mainland near the Castle of Mey in 1943. Simpson had not originally intended to buy the island but happened to be talking about it with a lawyer: "I said, 'I see Stroma was sold last week, and it's not sold this week. Is it on the market?' 'Yes,' he said, 'Stroma's for sale.' I said, "What kind of money?" So he told me what kind of money, and there and then, the lawyer wrote that I, James Simpson, offered to buy the island of Stroma at a certain figure, and I signed my name at the end of it." His wife was not enthusiastic about the purchase: "Lena nearly flew at me for being so stupid. She says, 'Stroma? What on earth are you going to do with an island?'". He was successful in his bid and used the island to graze his animals, repopulating it with around 200 sheep and 30 cattle. It is still used by the Simpson family for sheep grazing.

By this time, the five-member Manson family had become the last native inhabitants of Stroma, "Now liv[ing] in a silent community of empty houses, an empty church and an empty school." Although the head of the family, Andrew Manson, called the island "a paradise in summer" and a place where he was "free of outside distractions and watching my sons growing from boyhood to manhood – teaching them to live like men, to be dependent on no one," it was a bleak life for the women, who had applied for a council house at Scrabster, near Thurso. The Mansons finally left Stroma on 6 December 1962, bringing to an end thousands of years of permanent habitation on the island.

Island of ruins
Stroma is now entirely deserted by humans; its only permanent inhabitants are the seals, birds and sheep that live on the island. The church, school and old croft houses stand derelict, with many having fallen into ruin. The writer Bella Bathurst, visiting the island in the early 2010s, described the scene:

"The houses along the main road down the spine of the island seem to have rotted at different rates. Those crofts, which have somehow managed to keep their glazing and their roof-slates, are in much better condition than the others. In some, the furniture is still laid out as if only recently abandoned: iron bedsteads with mattresses, tables, armchairs, cupboards full of boots and bottles, everything arranged with the same care and compaction as it would be on a boat. But most crofts have already lost the war with the weather. As soon as the tiles go, the damp begins to sidle into the mortaring; within a couple of years all that is left are a few bony ribs and the stark gable ends."

Inside some of the houses, Bathurst writes, everyday objects still remain where they were left decades ago; "the bed and the limed matchboard ceiling are intact, untouched even by the damp. The kitchen table still stands in the parlour and a framed and fading photograph gazes out from the top of the mantelpiece." In another house seen 20 years earlier by Leslie Thomas, "was a rank of family photographs, shades in Victorian dress staring out forever into a room now desolate and holed, but which had once held the life of a warm family." Elsewhere, the books remain "dusty but tidy" in the abandoned school, and the church still contains its pulpit, "dumb and hung with ragged red tassles" with prayer books "left to be trampled upon by heathen sheep and nibbled by rabbits and rats." In the former post office, forms and licence applications and a bottle of dried ink still stand on the counter, while in a back room stands "a nice dresser, upon which [stands] a teapot and a jug and some sheet music: 'Red Sails in the Sunset', 'The General's Fast Asleep' and 'You Can't Do That There 'Ere.' Nobody on Stroma will ever sing those songs now."

Bathurst and Thomas express contrasting views on the significance of Stroma's abandonment. Thomas regards it as a tragedy: "Of all the out-of-the-way places I have known, this was the saddest. It seemed as though its life had been ended in a fit of pique." To Bathurst, however, "it is tempting to see Stroma's abandonment as the result of some appalling trauma. Abandonment is always taken as a sign of failure, a collective death ... But Stroma does not feel sad. True, there is sorrow in seeing the once meticulous vegetable patches turned over to weeds, or wondering how many more winters the box beds will stand before they start to rot. But that isn't the whole story. What is interesting about Stroma is not the fact of its abandonment, but the tale of its past."

The MeyGen tidal energy array is located on the ocean floor to the south of the island of Stroma. It has four 1.5 MW tidal turbines, which harness the power of the fast-flowing waters of the Inner Sound. They produced 25 GWh of electrical energy in 2019, enough to supply the electric needs of 4,000 homes. The project is being developed in a phased manner, with a potential capacity of 400 MW.

Communications
Stroma lacked a regular connection to the mainland until 1879, when the Post Office subsidised a weekly boat service from Huna on the mainland and established a post office on the island. However, the volume of mail from Stroma proved so small that the service was grossly uneconomical. By the 1950s, the Post Office was spending 1s. 2d. for each letter worth 2½d. in postage.

For many years, the islanders had no means of contacting the mainland in emergencies other than signalling with hand lamps and hoping that someone would see them. A radio telephone was installed in 1935, and in 1953 a telephone cable was laid. A red telephone box was installed in the centre of the island, symbolic of the 6 millionth phone box installation in the UK. It is still there today, though no longer in use.

It was not until 1894 that Stroma gained its first artificial landing point, a pier built from Portland cement near Nethertown at a cost of £800. In 1955, Caithness County Council constructed a new harbour on the south coast of the island at the then great cost of £28,500. Although it was intended to help stem the exodus of people from the island, Stroma was abandoned only a few years after the harbour's completion.

In the late 1930s Highland Airways looked into the possibility of including Stroma in the hospital ambulance plane service that was then in operation. On 19 August 1937, Captain E. E. Fresson of Highland Airways landed a small aircraft in farmland adjoining the Mains of Stroma, and the following spring the islanders cleared an area of moorland on the west side of the island to create an airstrip. The first official flight landed in June 1938. However, the Second World War prevented any further developments and a regular service was not established. After the war, Highland Airways was taken over by British European Airways, which abandoned any interest in serving the island.

Today, Stroma has no regular communications with the mainland. The island's owner ran occasional boat trips there on weekends for visitors, including Prince Charles, who painted watercolours of the abandoned houses.

Lighthouse
In 1890, a lighthouse was built at Stroma's northern tip, Langaton Point. It was only operational for six years before being replaced, and very little is now known about the structure. The unmanned lighthouse originally housed a Trotter-Lindberg lamp which burned petroleum spirit or lythene. The fuel supply was stored in cisterns near the lantern, which was regularly recharged at least fortnightly by the local fishermen or crofters. It was one of the first lighthouses in Scotland to use this type of "scintillating" light.

It was replaced in 1896, possibly on the same site, by a new lighthouse built to a design by David Stevenson as part of a major programme of construction works around northern Scotland. A fog warning system was installed the following year. Stevenson's lighthouse consists of a circular white-painted stone tower standing 23 m high at an elevation of 32 m above Mean High Water with a number of buildings nearby to house generators and the lighthouse keepers. The light was converted to a paraffin lamp when the former lythene lamp was found to be unsuitable. An oil store was installed in the lighthouse tower, ending the need for a separate building to hold the fuel. The lighthouse was subjected to a machine-gun attack by a German aircraft on 22 February 1941. It caused little damage and no injuries, and the keepers were soon able to make repairs.

Until 1961 the lighthouse was administered as a shore station, and subsequently (after the resident population of Stroma had left) as a rock station. An electric lamp with a maximum power of 1.1 million cp was installed in 1972, utilising a sealed beam optic mounted on a gearless revolving pedestal. By this time the keepers and their families were the only people living on Stroma. A helicopter pad was installed to enable supplies and personnel to be flown in. In 1997 the station was converted to automatic operation, utilising a 250-watt metal halide lamp which rotates on a gearless pedestal. A lens system from Sule Skerry lighthouse was refitted in the Stroma lighthouse. The old air-driven fog horn was removed and replaced by an electric fog signal which is installed on the balcony of the lighthouse. The lighthouse station's power, which was formerly obtained from generators, is now provided by batteries which are charged at regular intervals. The current light flashes white every 20 seconds and can be seen from a nominal range of 26 nmi.

Kennedy mausoleum and the mummies of Stroma
One curious side-effect of the constant spray of sea-water over Stroma – apart from making the drinking water brackish and giving the air a constant salt taste – was that it mummified the corpses of some of the island's inhabitants. They were housed in a mausoleum in the south-east corner of Stroma, built by the Kennedy family in 1677. The building still stands, although it is now unroofed. It comprises a two-storey structure which incorporates a burial vault and a dovecote. The building was constructed from grey flagstones and pink sandstone quoins. It measures 25 ft by 18 ft externally and standing 22 ft high. The lintel of the door bears the inscription "I.K." (Ioannes [i.e. John] Kennedy) and the date 1677.

The mummies of Stroma were something of a tourist attraction in the 18th century. The Welsh naturalist and traveller Thomas Pennant described the mummies as "entire and uncorrupted bodies of persons who had been dead sixty years. I was informed that they were very light, had a flexibility in their limbs and were of a dusky color." However, their popularity proved their undoing. In 1762 Bishop of Ross and Caithness Robert Forbes recorded in his journal that Murdoch Kennedy

"... played such wretched tricks on the Body of his Father, for the Diversion of Strangers, as in time broke it to pieces, and the Head was the part that fell first off. He used to place Strangers at his Father's Feet, and by setting a Foot on one of his Father's, he made the Body spring up speedily and salute them, which surprized [sic] them greatly. Then, after laying the body down again, he beat a march upon the Belly, which sounded equally loud with a Drum."

By 1786 the mummies had been destroyed by cattle and careless visitors as, according to Walker's Hibernian Magazine, "curiosity to see the mummies had brought many idle people to Stroma, [and] that some, out of wantonness had shattered the door, and others the bodies; and the door not being repaired, sheep and cattle entered the vault, and trampled them to pieces." There is now no trace of the original burials in the vault.

title: Island of Stroma


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Stroma

Stroma may refer to:

Biology

 * Stroma (tissue), the connective, functionally supportive framework of a biological cell, tissue, or organ (in contrast, the parenchyma is the functional aspect of a tissue)
 * Stroma of ovary, a soft tissue, well supplied with blood, consisting of spindle-shaped cells with a small amount of connective tissue
 * Stroma of iris, fibres and cells in the iris
 * Stroma of cornea, plates of collagen fibrils in the cornea
 * Lymph node stromal cell, cells which provide a scaffold for other lymph node cells
 * Stroma of bone marrow
 * Stroma (fungus), a tissue structure of some ascomycete mushrooms
 * Stroma (fluid), the fluid between grana, where carbohydrate-forming reactions occur in the chloroplasts of photosynthetic plant cells
 * Stromal cell, a connective tissue cell of any organ; supports the function of the parenchyma
 * The nonmalignant cells which are present in the tumor microenvironment; see

People

 * Freddie Stroma (born 1987), British actor known for playing Cormac McLaggen in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
 * Stroma Buttrose (born 1929), Australian architect

Other

 * Stroma (musical group), a New Zealand chamber music ensemble
 * Island of Stroma, a now uninhabited island off the northern coast of Scotland

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Stroma


text: User talk:69.62.23.130

title: User talk:69.62.23.130


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Oddworld

Oddworld is a video game series and fictional universe, created by developers Oddworld Inhabitants under the direction of Lorne Lanning. The series has been released on various platforms such as PlayStation, Xbox, PlayStation 3, Game Boy, Windows and Wii U.

Throughout games set in the Oddworld universe, the player's character goes on a quest to defend Oddworld's ecosystem from endangerment by industrial corporations.

Oddworld planet
Oddworld is the name of the planet on which all five Oddworld Inhabitants games are based, extant in another dimension. The planet was originally described as ten times the size of Earth; but Oddworld Inhabitants' president and creative developer Lorne Lanning has since explained that Oddworld's surface area is ten times the size of Earth's, given that Oddworld is predominantly a dry-land planet and Earth is predominantly water-covered. It has its own sun and thus its own orbit resulting in a unique clock and calendar.

At some point, the planet suffered huge natural turmoils that resulted in volcanic crusts forming a new layer upon the entire planet. When that crust collapsed, it created giant thousand-foot craters all over the planet. The planet has a total of three layers, each with its own climate, temperature and gravitational levels. The giant craters were then used by the various Oddworld species to house their cities, whose tips could be seen protruding above the crust surface when looking across the landscape.

Only one of Oddworld's continents has been featured in the games—Mudos—and only a tiny fraction of Mudos has been seen in-game. The journeys of Abe through Abe's Oddysee, Abe's Exoddus and Munch's Oddysee take him through that small portion, composed of fields, jungles, deserts, caverns and swamps. Much of the planet is decimated by industrialist species for their own profit; this is represented by city-sized factories and mass transit systems.

Oddworld species
The protagonist species of the games in the Oddworld universe are the Mudokons : an oviparous anthropoid with blue or green skin. In Abe's Oddysee, Abe's Exoddus and Munch's Oddysee, the Mudokons are peaceful, spiritual inhabitants of a mock-Paleolithic society. Oddworld creator Lorne Lanning has explained that the Mudokons were not always sympathetic protagonists, insofar as, though they represent a class of slaves exploited by the upper class, their ability to telepathically control other species contradicts that status. Their principal enemies are the Glukkons, a cephalopod-like anthropoid with only vestigial lower limbs (usually concealed by clothing), representing an industrial master class. Subordinate to the Glukkons are the Sligs, who appear as soldiers or body-servants. The Mudokons have two sacred or totemic species, both of which resemble arthropods, but are actually vertebrates: the towering Scrabs and the arachnid-like Paramites, whereof both are hunted by the Sligs on the Glukkons' behalf to make food or similar products. Mudokons, Scrabs, Paramites and Glukkons were designed by Steven Olds.

In Munch's Oddysee several creatures were added to the game. The Vykkers are purple, hairless humanoids with four arms and four legs. Interns resemble Vykkers, but have only two sets of limbs. Big Bro Sligs are bigger and more powerful Sligs, with armored versions of them occasionally being seen. Fuzzles are small, furry, spheroidal predator-scavengers. Meeps resemble sheep, but with only one limb and one eye. Gabbits are an amphibian species whose single hind leg serves as both feet and flukes.

Stranger's Wrath introduced new species such as the Clakkers, who are anthropomorphic, flightless birds); the Outlaws, bulbous, hairless, blue-green humanoids; the Steef, feline-featured, gracile-legged centaurs; the Grubbs, amphibian-like bipeds that are symbionts of the Steef; the Oktigi, amphibious, parasitic cephalopods related to the Glukkons; and the Gloktigi, large, cephalopod-like bipeds related to the Oktigi and Glukkons.

Oddworld: Soulstorm introduced replacement creatures such as the Sleeches to replace the Fleeches from Exoddus and a big Slig known as the 'Slig Mama' which a Slig operates inside a protective casing and fires missiles towards Abe and yells common Slig phrases like "Halt!" and "Freeze!"

In the Oddworld games, the GameSpeak feature allows the player to interact with the non-playable characters (NPCs). Examples of GameSpeak commands in the original game Abe's Oddysee are "Hello", "Follow me" and "Wait." Rescuing Mudokons and opening certain doors are all achieved through GameSpeak. Enemies possessed by Abe can also use GameSpeak, and one can take control of Slig guards, use Glukkons to command subservient Sligs, or use Sligs to call their Slog pets to heel. GameSpeak also included burps and flatulence, for comical effect. The GameSpeak feature was modified in Stranger's Wrath, with a single talk button that caused the Stranger to say something appropriate to the situation. This context-sensitive GameSpeak also worked for questioning the Clakker and Grubb townsfolk. This change made the talk button more comparable to a universal-action button.

Games set on Oddworld
The developers originally stated that the Oddworld series would be a pentalogy called the Oddworld Quintology, and that Abe's Exoddus and Stranger's Wrath were bonus titles not counting toward the total of five. The Oddworld Adventures games are handheld versions of Abe's Oddysee and Exoddus. The Quintology was halted after the first two games, when the company decided to redirect its efforts toward film production. There were also a few titles that were hinted at in interviews and press releases, but they were never developed.

Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee
At the beginning of this game, Abe is a happy, ignorant worker at RuptureFarms, a meat-packing plant, but he then discovers that the plant's boss Molluck the Glukkon has decided to use the factory's Mudokon slaves as a source of meat. At the end of the game's introductory sequence, which is a retrospective voice-over by Abe, he runs for his life. The Mudokons' spiritual leader, the BigFace, reveals that the Paramites and Scrabs slaughtered and processed by the Glukkons were formerly sacred to the Mudokons, and orders Abe to relight holy flames extinguished by the Glukkons. Having done this, Abe is empowered by BigFace and infiltrates RuptureFarms, where he frees the remaining slaves and destroys the Glukkon board of executives, but is himself captured. Should the player save a certain number of Mudokons, their free compatriots rescue Abe, and he receives a hero's welcome from the Mudokons he rescued. Should the player not save a sufficient number, Abe is executed by Molluck.

Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus
Abe's Oddysee was very popular, and the bonus game Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus was released the following year. Abe's Exoddus begins where Abe's Oddysee ends. Abe's abilities in this game were similar to his abilities in the first game, with an expanded ability to communicate with other characters in the world using GameSpeak. Here, Abe is informed by ghosts of his species that Necrum, a Mudokon burial ground, is being excavated by Glukkons, using blind Mudokons as slaves. Abe then departs, with his companions Alf, Ben, Phos, Han and Luke to find a cure to the sickness caused by the SoulStorm Brew, created from the excavated bones. Having cured his friends, he destroys the brewery. If the player is successful, Abe is again rescued by his friends; if not, he is captured by the brewery's owner and electrocuted.

Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee
Not long after the events of Abe's Exoddus, Abe helps Munch (the last living remnant of an amphibious race called the Gabbits) to save the Gabbits' eggs from destruction, in exchange for Munch's help in rescuing more captive Mudokons.

Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath is an action-adventure game published for the Xbox in 2005. The game's main character is a bounty hunter named Stranger. The game utilizes both third- and first-person perspectives and is less puzzle-oriented than the previous three Oddworld games. The game has a Wild West setting. It was later ported to the PC and released through the digital distribution service Steam.

Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty!
Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty! is a full remake of Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee developed by Just Add Water and published by Oddworld Inhabitants. It was released in July 2014 for the PlayStation 4 with later releases for additional platforms such as Microsoft Windows, Xbox One, Wii U, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita. The game also had a physical version released for a limited time for PS4 and the PS Vita in 2016 from Limited Run Games. In 2019, LRG also released a physical version for the PS3. In August 2020, New 'n' Tasty was announced to be releasing on the Nintendo Switch in October 2020.

Oddworld: Soulstorm
Oddworld: Soulstorm is a direct sequel to Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty! and a reimagining of the story from Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus, rather than a direct remake. It was developed and published by Oddworld Inhabitants and released in April 2021 for Windows, PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. An 'Enhanced Edition' was later released in November 2021 alongside a port for Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.

Unreleased titles

 * Oddworld: The Hand of Odd. A real-time strategy game planned to be online. Although being halted when Citizen Siege was planned, it has since been revived as plans for its development have been announced. Said to be in production after Abe HD. It is said to be free-to-play with optional extras that may be purchased.
 * SligStorm. It would have followed the story of an albino Slig who was born in a complex it must escape to avoid infanticide, and would have been included with Abe's Oddysee and Abe's Exoddus in a combined package. On 9 May 2011, an Oddworld Inhabitants representative released a list of FAQ answers in relation to future games, confirming Sligstorm will be worked on after Abe HD and The Hand of Odd. It is not clear where in the Oddworld continuity the game will fit.
 * The Brutal Ballad of Fangus Klot. Originally intended to be the next game following Stranger's Wrath. Announced in April 2005, Fangus Klot was cancelled by Oddworld Inhabitants founders Lorne Lanning and Sherry McKenna over deal disagreements with publisher Majesco Entertainment. In the 9 May 2011 FAQ, an Oddworld Inhabitants representative confirmed Fangus Klot is in future plans.
 * Oddworld: Squeek's Oddysee. Expected third game in the original pentalogy following the first two entries Abe's Oddysee and Munch's Oddysee. In the 9 May 2011 FAQ, an Oddworld Inhabitants representative confirmed Squeek's Oddysee is on the cards after The Hand of Odd, Abe HD, The Brutal Ballad of Fangus Klot and Sligstorm are released.
 * Oddworld: Munch's Exoddus. Expected to be a bonus game based on Munch's Oddysee outside of the original pentalogy, in the same way that Abe's Exoddus was to Abe's Oddysee. It would have featured Munch traveling to a land named Ma'Spa to hatch the Gabbit eggs acquired from the original game. It is unknown whether or not the game was cancelled or halted.
 * Oddworld: Slave Circus. In an AMA on Reddit, Lorne Lanning discussed a possible future "gladiator"-type Oddworld title, in which the player could purchase and battle slaves. "I have been fixated on a game called "oddworld Slave Circus". It is seriously whack. You start the game by buying a slave. Think Gladiators on Oddworld. Have done a tremendous amount of work on this and have never mentioned it. But it is in the coffer and there may be some light for it down the road. But has some other contingencies depending on it. Requires new level of social integration into console gaming. It's insane. Hopefully not so insane it won't come to life."
 * Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath 2. On 17 January 2013, on the Oddworld website, the Oddworld team asked which game fans would like to see after completion on "Abe's Oddysee New 'n' Tasty". Among the options was "Stranger's Wrath 2".
 * Stranger Arena. A competitive multi-player game using gameplay mechanics from Stranger's Wrath.

OddBoxx
In 2009, the director of Oddworld, Lorne Lanning, announced that they planned to make an Oddworld digital download package for PC. This package contains Abe's Oddysee, Abe's Exoddus, Munch's Oddysee and Stranger's Wrath. Oddworld Inhabitants unveiled their re-designed website on 4 November 2010, also declaring that the Oddboxx was still in development. On 6 December, they announced that the Oddboxx would be released for the 2010 holiday season. The European and U.S. prices were revealed on 14 December. On 17 December, Oddworld Inhabitants announced the Oddboxx's release date as 20 December, with a 25% discount offer running until 9AM (PST) the following morning. On 20 December 2010, the Oddboxx was released on Steam. Achievements have been added to the two 3D games—Munch's Oddysee received 30, and Stranger's Wrath gained 20.

On 29 April 2011, JAW announced at GameCity Nights that the Oddboxx would be coming to the PlayStation Network (with other platforms to be announced). Stranger's Wrath HD was released on PlayStation 3 on 27 December 2011, and Munch's Oddysee HD in December 2012. Stranger's Wrath has 37 Trophies and Munch's Oddysee has 45 Trophies. Every Oddworld title is now available on the PSN, making the PS3 and Vita the only consoles to offer the entire Oddboxx other than the PC. These remakes are currently cancelled for Xbox 360.

Characters
Abe is the strongly developed central character of the Oddworld series. He can also use GameSpeak, a way of communicating with other characters in the game. Along with Spyro the Dragon and Crash Bandicoot, Abe was one of the unofficial mascots of the PlayStation. Computer and Video Games described Abe as "a new platform hero" and a "brilliant character." Lorne Lanning, Oddworld's creator, has stated that its "characters are driven in a way that is fired by larger [moral] issues." The physical characteristics of the Glukkon species, principally its elongated head and gangly frame, were inspired by those of the villainous Teacher character from the film Pink Floyd – The Wall (1982).

Abe is the most strongly developed central character of the Oddworld series. He was inspired by the diamond miners of South Africa, who along with other indigenous peoples have suffered the ruthless harvesting of their land and people by industrial profiteers. He evolves and develops throughout the first game, Abe's Oddysee. He is initially a slave along with his fellow Mudokons, but escapes. The game's narrative and its main character deal with ethical and moral issues. Lorne Lanning, Oddworld's creator, has stated that its "characters are driven in a way that is fired by larger issues." Abe was the first protagonist that Oddworld Inhabitants developed. Lanning stated that Abe was named after Abraham of the Old Testament, because of the similarities between Abe trying to discover himself and for what he believes was the difficulty in trying to determine the true source of Abraham's discovery of monotheism.

Originally, the game's developers envisioned Abe and a mule-like creature called "Elum" beginning the game together, living off the land and being thrust into an industrialized factory slave environment. The developers came to the conclusion that the story was stronger should Abe come from a factory existence and later reveal one of self-sustenance, and as such the concept was eventually changed. In this game, Abe tells his story in flashback, which helps the player identify with him as the protagonist. Abe's abilities include chanting, which permits him to take over the mind of some of his enemies. He can also jump, climb, run, and sneak in shadows.

Reception
The Oddworld games have received more than 100 industry awards. Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee received more than 24 awards and three nominations from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences over 1997 and 1998. In 2010, Game Informer included it on the list of ten gaming franchises that should be revived, specifically counting for the return of Abe.

As of 18 March 2014, the digital releases of Abe's Oddysee and Abe's Exoddus have sold one million units. The digital releases of all games combined have sold two million units. The franchise as a whole has sold seven million copies.

Other media
Oddworld is featured in the first episode of Icons, a documentary series aired on G4 that showcases significant milestones in video game history. In addition, various bumpers starring characters from Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee were aired on the G4 television network to announce commercial breaks.

Oddworld is referenced in the 2007 television series Code Monkeys. In the tenth episode of season one ("Third Reich's the Charm") Lorne Lanning appears as a fictionalized version of himself and pitches the idea of Oddworld to a fictional video game company, which results in him being tased and thrown out of a window.

Abe, Munch and Stranger appear in the LittleBigPlanet video game series as costumes for Sackboy.

title: Oddworld


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Culture of Macau

Macau is an autonomous territory within China. A Portuguese colony until 1999, Macau has a diverse culture firmly rooted in Cantonese culture, with a mix of influences from East Asia and Western Europe. Macau is known for being the largest gambling center in the world.

People and languages
The two official languages of Macau are Chinese and Portuguese, although the latter is only spoken by a small minority. English is also widely spoken. , 80.1% of the population speak Cantonese as their daily language.

In 2018 Reuters stated "there are signs that Chinese is being prioritized in government."

The Macanese language, generally known as Patuá, is a distinctive creole that is still spoken by several dozen members of the Macanese people, an ethnic group of mixed Asian and Portuguese ancestry that accounts for a small percentage of Macau's population.

Signs in Macau are displayed in both Traditional Chinese and Portuguese. In contrast to mainland China, Macau—along with Hong Kong and Taiwan—generally does not use Simplified Chinese characters.

Among the main migrants of the country are skilled workers from the Philippines, hence Tagalog is one of the most-heard foreign languages.

Cultural identity
The worldwide popularity of Cantonese food and Chinese martial arts (kung fu or wu shu) has made them popular in Portugal as well.

In 1998, the first Festival da Lusofonia took place in Macau, a festival of Portuguese-speaking communities. In November 2013, the 16th edition of the festival took place over the duration of two and a half days with musical activities, kids programmes, traditional Portuguese games and food from Portuguese-speaking countries' cuisines.

Mass media
Most of the pop music that can be heard on the channel TDM Teledifusão de Macau (澳廣視) is imported from Hong Kong or overseas (mainly Japan). However, more and more local songs are being recorded by locals. Some Brazilian TV stations are also broadcast in Macau.

Cuisine
Macanese cuisine is a blend of southern Chinese (especially Cantonese cuisine) and Portuguese cuisines, with significant influences from Southeast Asia and the Lusophone world. The most famous snack is the Portuguese-style egg tart. It is widely popular in Southeast Asia, especially in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The most famous Macanese food is galinha à portuguesa, which is served in numerous varieties in Macau restaurants.

In 2018 Reuters stated that the cuisine was one of the few remaining Portuguese influences in Macau.

Religion
The primary religion is Buddhism. Roman Catholicism has considerable influence in education and social welfare in Macau. However, adherents only count for about six percent of the population. Protestantism is spreading quickly, especially among the younger demographic groups.

Film
A few independent films have been produced since the late 1990s. Recent Macau film productions include:
 * 窗前熗後 by Vincent Hui (2000)
 * Love Is Not A Sin (鍾意無罪) by Doug Chan (2003). Winner of Golden DV Award (27th HKIFF), Winner of The Best Original Screenplay Award (1st Downunder International Film Festival, Darwin).
 * macau.xmas.2005 (澳門.聖誕.2005) by Sio (2005).
 * Macao 2525 (2021). Nominated for best digital animation at the Film & TV World Cup 2021 at the Lima Web Fest in Peru.

 * The Edge Of Human by Johan Karlberg and Angela Lao (2022). First Macanese Cyberpunk movie, nominated for best experimental film at the Film & TV World Cup 2022 Pinewood Studios Lift Off Sessions in London UK. Finished 4th place of 42 in the network round.

 * Return To Earth - Macau Sci-fi (2023) by Johan Karlberg and Angela Lao. Finished Top 4 of 15 nominated finalists at BCT Cinema E Televisione festival in Italy (best feature film);. declared the best Asian feature film in the festival.

Music
The Macau International Music Festival is conducted by the Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Macau SAR Government every autumn. The 20th anniversary of the MIMF was celebrated in 2007 with performances of Jazz, classical music, electronica, Chinese folk-pop, rock and Fado.

Other Lusophone music types popular in Macao are samba, bossa nova, and kizomba.

In 2005, the Hush!! Full Band Festival got established, a government-sponsored modern music festival featuring pop rock and hard rock bands from all over Asia with a focus on Macau bands. The festival is free of charge and it's in its 9th edition in 2013.

Literature
The literature of Macanese (i.e. those with Portuguese descent) is a multi-dimensional art. Their literature appeared as early as the 19th century. At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of well-known writers appeared:
 * Anthology "Lonely Road": TancareiraBela, Tancareira Pensativa and CancāoDe Tancareira by Leanel Alves.
 * Anthology "Blessed Garden, Macau" by Jose dos Santos Ferreira.
 * Short fiction "The Gown" by Deolinda de Conceição
 * Long fiction: "Love and small toes" & "The Bewitching Braid" written by Henrique de Senna Fernandes
 * Anthology "Four Seasons in One Day" – Carlos Marreiros
 * Other:
 * "Chinese Urheen" by Camilo Pessanha (1867–1926)
 * "The Chart of Maritime Countries (海國圖志)", "Listens to the Dulcimer & Song playing by a foreign lady in the Macau Garden (澳门花园听夷女洋琴歌)" written by Wei Yuan (魏源 1794–1857), displayed his personal feeling and understanding of classical music.

Cantonese opera
Cantonese opera is quite popular, especially among elderly residents. In 2003, the Cultural Institute of the Macau S.A.R Government, in collaboration with the Leisure and Cultural Services Department of the Hong Kong SAR, organized the exhibition "Fong Yim Fun – The Life and Work of a Cantonese Opera Artiste". As a well-known actress and opera artiste in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau, Fong Yim Fun performed in more than 150 operas and films. Part of her works was exhibited in the Museum of Macau at that time.

Facilities

The Macao Cultural Centre was established in 1999, for the purpose of offering unique venues for artistic events, international conferences and exhibitions, enhancing cultural exchange, and helping to expand culture horizons among Macau residents. Hundreds of programs and events take place there almost every day—e.g., martial arts performances, European traditional music, Chinese traditional music, foreign music, varies types of dancing, etc.

The Macau Ricci Institute is a recent foundation of the Jesuits in Macau. Its aim is to continue the process of friendly encounters between Chinese and European cultures and traditions, which was begun by Matteo Ricci 1552–1610 many years ago.

title: Culture of Macau


text:
Hypercholesterolemia

Hypercholesterolemia, also called high cholesterol, is the presence of high levels of cholesterol in the blood. It is a form of hyperlipidemia (high levels of lipids in the blood), hyperlipoproteinemia (high levels of lipoproteins in the blood), and dyslipidemia (any abnormalities of lipid and lipoprotein levels in the blood).

Elevated levels of non-HDL cholesterol and LDL in the blood may be a consequence of diet, obesity, inherited (genetic) diseases (such as LDL receptor mutations in familial hypercholesterolemia), or the presence of other diseases such as type 2 diabetes and an underactive thyroid.

Cholesterol is one of three major classes of lipids produced and used by all animal cells to form membranes. Plant cells manufacture phytosterols (similar to cholesterol), but in rather small quantities. Cholesterol is the precursor of the steroid hormones and bile acids. Since cholesterol is insoluble in water, it is transported in the blood plasma within protein particles (lipoproteins). Lipoproteins are classified by their density: very low density lipoprotein (VLDL), intermediate density lipoprotein (IDL), low density lipoprotein (LDL) and high density lipoprotein (HDL). All the lipoproteins carry cholesterol, but elevated levels of the lipoproteins other than HDL (termed non-HDL cholesterol), particularly LDL-cholesterol, are associated with an increased risk of atherosclerosis and coronary heart disease. In contrast, higher levels of HDL cholesterol are protective.

Avoiding trans fats and replacing saturated fats in adult diets with polyunsaturated fats are recommended dietary measures to reduce total blood cholesterol and LDL in adults. In people with very high cholesterol (e.g., familial hypercholesterolemia), diet is often not sufficient to achieve the desired lowering of LDL, and lipid-lowering medications are usually required. If necessary, other treatments such as LDL apheresis or even surgery (for particularly severe subtypes of familial hypercholesterolemia) are performed. About 34 million adults in the United States have high blood cholesterol.

Signs and symptoms

Although hypercholesterolemia itself is asymptomatic, longstanding elevation of serum cholesterol can lead to atherosclerosis (build-up of fatty plaques in the arteries, so-called 'hardening of the arteries'). Over a period of decades, elevated serum cholesterol contributes to formation of atheromatous plaques in the arteries. This can lead to progressive narrowing of the involved arteries. Alternatively smaller plaques may rupture and cause a clot to form and obstruct blood flow. A sudden blockage of a coronary artery may result in a heart attack. A blockage of an artery supplying the brain can cause a stroke. If the development of the stenosis or occlusion is gradual, blood supply to the tissues and organs slowly diminishes until organ function becomes impaired. At this point tissue ischemia (restriction in blood supply) may manifest as specific symptoms. For example, temporary ischemia of the brain (commonly referred to as a transient ischemic attack) may manifest as temporary loss of vision, dizziness and impairment of balance, difficulty speaking, weakness or numbness or tingling, usually on one side of the body. Insufficient blood supply to the heart may cause chest pain, and ischemia of the eye may manifest as transient visual loss in one eye. Insufficient blood supply to the legs may manifest as calf pain when walking, while in the intestines it may present as abdominal pain after eating a meal.

Some types of hypercholesterolemia lead to specific physical findings. For example, familial hypercholesterolemia (Type IIa hyperlipoproteinemia) may be associated with xanthelasma palpebrarum (yellowish patches underneath the skin around the eyelids), arcus senilis (white or gray discoloration of the peripheral cornea), and xanthomata (deposition of yellowish cholesterol-rich material) of the tendons, especially of the fingers. Type III hyperlipidemia may be associated with xanthomata of the palms, knees and elbows.

Causes
Hypercholesterolemia is typically due to a combination of environmental and genetic factors. Environmental factors include weight, diet, and stress. Loneliness is also a risk factor.

Diet
Diet has an effect on blood cholesterol, but the size of this effect varies between individuals.

A diet high in sugar or saturated fats increases total cholesterol and LDL. Trans fats have been shown to reduce levels of high-density lipoprotein while increasing levels of LDL.

A 2016 review found tentative evidence that dietary cholesterol is associated with higher blood cholesterol. As of 2018 there appears to be a modest positive, dose-related relationship between cholesterol intake and LDL cholesterol.

Medical conditions and treatments
A number of other conditions can also increase cholesterol levels including diabetes mellitus type 2, obesity, alcohol use, monoclonal gammopathy, dialysis therapy, nephrotic syndrome, hypothyroidism, Cushing's syndrome and anorexia nervosa. Several medications and classes of medications may interfere with lipid metabolism: thiazide diuretics, ciclosporin, glucocorticoids, beta blockers, retinoic acid, antipsychotics, certain anticonvulsants and medications for HIV as well as interferons.

Genetics
Genetic contributions typically arise from the combined effects of multiple genes, known as "polygenic," although in certain cases, they may stem from a single gene defect, as seen in familial hypercholesterolemia. In familial hypercholesterolemia, mutations may be present in the APOB gene (autosomal dominant), the autosomal recessive LDLRAP1 gene, autosomal dominant familial hypercholesterolemia (HCHOLA3) variant of the PCSK9 gene, or the LDL receptor gene. Familial hypercholesterolemia affects about one in 250 individuals.

The Lithuanian Jewish population may exhibit a genetic founder effect. One variation, G197del LDLR which is implicated in familial hypercholesterolemia, has been dated to the 14th century. The of these variations has been the subject of debate.

Diagnosis
Cholesterol is measured in milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) of blood in the United States and some other countries. In the United Kingdom, most European countries and Canada, millimoles per liter of blood (mmol/L) is the measure.

For healthy adults, the UK National Health Service recommends upper limits of total cholesterol of 5 mmol/L, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL) of 3 mmol/L. For people at high risk of cardiovascular disease, the recommended limit for total cholesterol is 4 mmol/L, and 2 mmol/L for LDL.

In the United States, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute within the National Institutes of Health classifies total cholesterol of less than 200 mg/dL as "desirable", 200 to 239 mg/dL as "borderline high", and 240 mg/dL or more as "high".

There is no absolute cutoff between normal and abnormal cholesterol levels, and values must be considered in relation to other health conditions and risk factors.

Higher levels of total cholesterol increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, particularly coronary heart disease. Levels of LDL or non-HDL cholesterol both predict future coronary heart disease; which is the better predictor is disputed. High levels of small dense LDL may be particularly adverse, although measurement of small dense LDL is not advocated for risk prediction. In the past, LDL and VLDL levels were rarely measured directly due to cost.

Levels of fasting triglycerides were taken as an indicator of VLDL levels (generally about 45% of fasting triglycerides is composed of VLDL), while LDL was usually estimated by the Friedewald formula:

LDL $$\approx$$ total cholesterol – HDL – (0.2 x fasting triglycerides).

However, this equation is not valid on nonfasting blood samples or if fasting triglycerides are elevated (>4.5 mmol/L or >~400 mg/dL). Recent guidelines have, therefore, advocated the use of direct methods for measurement of LDL wherever possible. It may be useful to measure all lipoprotein subfractions (VLDL, IDL, LDL, and HDL) when assessing hypercholesterolemia and measurement of apolipoproteins and lipoprotein (a) can also be of value. Genetic screening is now advised if a form of familial hypercholesterolemia is suspected.

Classification
Classically, hypercholesterolemia was categorized by lipoprotein electrophoresis and the Fredrickson classification. Newer methods, such as "lipoprotein subclass analysis", have offered significant improvements in understanding the connection with atherosclerosis progression and clinical consequences. If the hypercholesterolemia is hereditary (familial hypercholesterolemia), more often a family history of premature, earlier onset atherosclerosis is found.

Screening method
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force in 2008 strongly recommends routine screening for men 35 years and older and women 45 years and older for lipid disorders and the treatment of abnormal lipids in people who are at increased risk of coronary heart disease. They also recommend routinely screening men aged 20 to 35 years and women aged 20 to 45 years if they have other risk factors for coronary heart disease. In 2016 they concluded that testing the general population under the age of 40 without symptoms is of unclear benefit.

In Canada, screening is recommended for men 40 and older and women 50 and older. In those with normal cholesterol levels, screening is recommended once every five years. Once people are on a statin further testing provides little benefit except possibly to determine compliance with treatment.

In the UK, after someone is diagnosed with familial hypercholesterolemia, clinicians, family, or both, contact first- and second-degree relatives to come forward for testing and treatment. Research suggests that clinician-only contact results in more people coming forward for testing.

Treatment
Treatment recommendations have been based on four risk levels for heart disease. For each risk level, LDL cholesterol levels representing goals and thresholds for treatment and other action are made. The higher the risk category, the lower the cholesterol thresholds.

For those at high risk, a combination of lifestyle modification and statins has been shown to decrease mortality.

Lifestyle
Lifestyle changes recommended for those with high cholesterol include: smoking cessation, limiting alcohol consumption, increasing physical activity, and maintaining a healthy weight.

Overweight or obese individuals can lower blood cholesterol by losing weight – on average a kilogram of weight loss can reduce LDL cholesterol by 0.8 mg/dl.

Diet
Eating a diet with a high proportion of vegetables, fruit, dietary fibre, and low in fats results in a modest decrease in total cholesterol.

Eating dietary cholesterol causes a small rise in serum cholesterol, the magnitude of which can be predicted using the Keys and Hegsted equations. Dietary limits for cholesterol were proposed in United States, but not in Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia. However, in 2015 the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee in the United States removed its recommendation of limiting cholesterol intake.

A 2020 Cochrane review found replacing saturated fat with polyunsaturated fat resulted in a small decrease in cardiovascular disease by decreasing blood cholesterol. Other reviews have not found an effect from saturated fats on cardiovascular disease. Trans fats are recognized as a potential risk factor for cholesterol-related cardiovascular disease, and avoiding them in an adult diet is recommended.

The National Lipid Association recommends that people with familial hypercholesterolemia restrict intakes of total fat to 25–35% of energy intake, saturated fat to less than 7% of energy intake, and cholesterol to less than 200 mg per day. Changes in total fat intake in low calorie diets do not appear to affect blood cholesterol.

Increasing soluble fiber consumption has been shown to reduce levels of LDL cholesterol, with each additional gram of soluble fiber reducing LDL by an average of 2.2 mg/dL (0.057 mmol/L). Increasing consumption of whole grains also reduces LDL cholesterol, with whole grain oats being particularly effective. Inclusion of 2 g per day of phytosterols and phytostanols and 10 to 20 g per day of soluble fiber decreases dietary cholesterol absorption. A diet high in fructose can raise LDL cholesterol levels in the blood.

Medication
Statins are the typically used medications, in addition to healthy lifestyle interventions. Statins can reduce total cholesterol by about 50% in the majority of people, and are effective in reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease in both people with and without pre-existing cardiovascular disease. In people without cardiovascular disease, statins have been shown to reduce all-cause mortality, fatal and non-fatal coronary heart disease, and strokes. Greater benefit is observed with the use of high-intensity statin therapy. Statins may improve quality of life when used in people without existing cardiovascular disease (i.e. for primary prevention). Statins decrease cholesterol in children with hypercholesterolemia, but no studies as of 2010 show improved outcomes and diet is the mainstay of therapy in childhood.

Other agents that may be used include fibrates, nicotinic acid, and cholestyramine. These, however, are only recommended if statins are not tolerated or in pregnant women. Injectable antibodies against the protein PCSK9 (evolocumab, bococizumab, alirocumab) can reduce LDL cholesterol and have been shown to reduce mortality.

Guidelines
In the US, guidelines exist from the National Cholesterol Education Program (2004) and a joint body of professional societies led by the American Heart Association.

In the UK, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence has made recommendations for the treatment of elevated cholesterol levels, published in 2008, and a new guideline appeared in 2014 that covers the prevention of cardiovascular disease in general.

The Task Force for the management of dyslipidaemias of the European Society of Cardiology and the European Atherosclerosis Society published guidelines for the management of dyslipidaemias in 2011.

Specific populations
Among people whose life expectancy is relatively short, hypercholesterolemia is not a risk factor for death by any cause including coronary heart disease. Among people older than 70, hypercholesterolemia is not a risk factor for being hospitalized with myocardial infarction or angina. There are also increased risks in people older than 85 in the use of statin drugs. Because of this, medications which lower lipid levels should not be routinely used among people with limited life expectancy.

The American College of Physicians recommends for hypercholesterolemia in people with diabetes:
 * 1) Lipid-lowering therapy should be used for secondary prevention of cardiovascular mortality and morbidity for all adults with known coronary artery disease and type 2 diabetes.
 * 2) Statins should be used for primary prevention against macrovascular (coronary artery disease, cerebrovascular disease, or peripheral vascular disease) complications in adults with type 2 diabetes and other cardiovascular risk factors.
 * 3) Once lipid-lowering therapy is initiated, people with type 2 diabetes mellitus should be taking at least moderate doses of a statin.
 * 4) For those people with type 2 diabetes who are taking statins, routine monitoring of liver function tests or muscle enzymes is not recommended except in specific circumstances.

Alternative medicine
A 2002 survey found that 1.1% of U.S. adults who used alternative medicine did so to treat high cholesterol. Consistent with previous surveys, this one found the majority of individuals (55%) used it in conjunction with conventional medicine. A systematic review of the effectiveness of herbal medicines used in traditional Chinese medicine had inconclusive results due to the poor methodological quality of the included studies. A review of trials of phytosterols and/or phytostanols, average dose 2.15 g/day, reported an average of 9% lowering of LDL-cholesterol. In 2000, the Food and Drug Administration approved the labeling of foods containing specified amounts of phytosterol esters or phytostanol esters as cholesterol-lowering; in 2003, an FDA Interim Health Claim Rule extended that label claim to foods or dietary supplements delivering more than 0.8 g/day of phytosterols or phytostanols. Some researchers, however, are concerned about diet supplementation with plant sterol esters and draw attention to lack of long-term safety data.

Epidemiology
Rates of high total cholesterol in the United States in 2010 are just over 13%, down from 17% in 2000.

Average total cholesterol in the United Kingdom is 5.9 mmol/L, while in rural China and Japan, average total cholesterol is 4 mmol/L. Rates of coronary artery disease are high in Great Britain, but low in rural China and Japan.

Research directions
Gene therapy is being studied as a potential treatment.

title: Hypercholesterolemia


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Kam Ning

Kam Ning is a violinist and daughter of the violinist-composer Kam Kee Yong (甘琦勇), and grandchild of Kam Beng Soo and Ooi Kooi Aun. Born in Singapore in 1975, she was given violin lessons at the age of six by the elder Kam, and had her early education at the Methodist Girls' School.

Life
In 1987, she received scholarships from the Lee Foundation and Shaw Foundation to study in the Yehudi Menuhin School, where she attended lessons and masterclasses conducted by Lord Menuhin himself and collaborated with him in chamber and orchestral performances at the age of 11. In her second year at the school, she played at the Royal Festival Hall with the Wren Orchestra of London, and her debut performance to a packed Victoria Concert Hall in Singapore. In 1993, Kam furthered her music education at the Curtis Institute of Music to study with Jaime Laredo and Yumi Scott and received her bachelor's degree there. She graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Music with a Masters of Music Degree and an Artist Diploma in 2001, under the tutelage of Donald Weilerstein.

The young Kam appeared in an episode of the popular British television programme Blue Peter when she was twelve, playing Paganini's Caprice No.5 in a segment featuring students from the Yehudi Menuhin School. In 1990, Kam received the Outstanding Young Artist of the Competition prize in the Royal Over-Seas League Music Competition in Britain and in 1991, she won first prize in the Junior Section of the Folkestone Menuhin International Violin Competition, in Britain. She was awarded theYoung Artist Award by the National Arts Council in 2000. In 2001, her performance took the second place Prix du Gouvernement Fédérale Belge Eugéne Ysaye in the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition in Belgium in 2001.

Kam Ning has since performed with many world-class orchestras like the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the National Orchestra of Belgium, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the City of London Sinfonia and the Luxembourg Philharmonic, Malaysian Philharmonic, Helsinki Philharmonic, and Toronto Symphony, just to name a few. In her performance with the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana under Menuhin in Switzerland in 1991, she was praised by critics as a "brilliant young violinist from Singapore" for her outstanding performance of Mendelssohn's E-minor Violin Concerto. As an artist who is keen on venturing off the beaten path, she has collaborated with her brother, percussionist Francis Kam, on concert tours in Taiwan, featuring contemporary music including works by their father, Kam Kee Yong.

Kam Ning counts her father Kam Kee Yong, and mentor Yehudi Menuhin as her most important sources of influence. To her, Menuhin remains "the most imaginative man she has ever met" for his repertoire in violin-playing. Her father's strict teaching instilled a sense of discipline in her, as he set high expectations from her.

title: Kam Ning


text:
The Brier

The Brier (Le Brier), known since 2023 as the Montana's Brier for sponsorship reasons, is the annual Canadian men's curling championship, sanctioned by Curling Canada. The Brier has been held since 1927, traditionally during the month of March.

The winner of the Brier goes on to represent Canada at the World Curling Championships of the same year. The Brier is the best supported curling competition in terms of paid attendance, attracting crowds far larger than even those for World Championships held in Canada.

Its current main sponsor is Montana's, a Canadian restaurant chain. "Brier" originally referred to a brand of tobacco sold by the event's first sponsor, the Macdonald Tobacco Company.

History
In 1924, George J. Cameron, the president of the W. L. Mackenzie and Company subsidiary of the Macdonald Tobacco Company, pitched the idea of a national curling championship to Macdonald Tobacco and was accepted. At the time Canadian curling was divided between the use of granite and iron curling stones, with the latter being used in Quebec and Eastern Ontario and the former being used everywhere else. The granite camp held the advantage, as Macdonald Tobacco's T. Howard Stewart, brother of company president Walter Stewart, supported the use of granites, and was able to influence the decision to use granite stones for the new national championship.

Macdonald Tobacco further developed the concept, in 1925 and 1926, by sponsoring the winners of the "Macdonald Brier Trophy" at the MCA Bonspiel to travel to Eastern Canada. In 1925, the Manitoba team played a number of exhibition games against local teams, while the 1926 team played in the Quebec Bonspiel. The visits were deemed popular enough for Macdonald Tobacco to move forward with sponsorship of a full national championship in 1927.

The first Brier was held at the Granite Club in Toronto in 1927. Eight teams from across the country participated, representing Western Canada, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Northern Ontario, Toronto and Montreal. Games lasted 14 ends, and each team played each other in a 7-game round robin with no playoffs unless there was a tie for first. The first Brier champion was Nova Scotia, a rink skipped by Murray Macneill, with teammates Al MacInnes, Cliff Torey and Jim Donahue – who were normally skips in their own right, but were added to the Macneill rink because the rest of his normal team could not make the trip.

By 1928, games were shortened to 12 ends in length and the single Western Canada team was replaced by individual teams from Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, increasing the total number of teams to 10 – seven provinces, two cities and the region of Northern Ontario. In the 1932 Brier, the cities of Montreal and Toronto were dropped from competition, but Northern Ontario kept its entry, and still remains the only non provincial or territorial entry to this day. In 1936, Prince Edward Island and British Columbia were given entries. The Dominion of Newfoundland did not become part of Canada until after the 1949 Brier, so the team representing the new province of Newfoundland (later Newfoundland and Labrador) did not join the Brier until 1951. In 1975, a single combined team representing the federal territories of Yukon and Northwest Territories joined the Brier competition. In 1977, games were shortened to 10 ends, which is the current length for matches. Games had to be played in their entirety until the 1974 Brier, when the rules were changed to the present standard of allowing a team to concede defeat before the end of the match if they wished.

The Brier would continue to be played at the Granite Club in Toronto through to the 1940 competition. After then, the event would travel around the country, and would be played in all 10 provinces. Also at this point, rocks were coloured differently for each team and were matched to be of equal size. Play was discontinued between 1943 and 1945 due to World War II. After World War II, the event became more of a popular sporting spectacle across the country thanks to Macdonald Tobacco enlisting media outlets to cover the event. In 1946, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) began covering the event live across the country on the radio. By the 1960s, the CBC began showing curling on television, at first giving daily half-hour reports. In 1962, the CBC showed the tie-breaking playoff match up. In 1973, CBC began regularly showing live coverage of the final draw of the event. Today, TSN covers the entire tournament. CBC had covered the semi-finals and the finals up until the 2007–08 season. In 2013, Sportsnet and City began to offer coverage of the finals of the provincial playdowns in Manitoba, Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia as well.

In 1977, Macdonald Tobacco announced it would no longer be sponsoring the Brier, and the 1979 event would be the last one titled the Macdonald Brier. A committee headed by the Canadian Curling Association (today's Curling Canada) was put in charge to find a new sponsor, which would end up being the Labatt Brewing Company. The event retained the "Brier" name, despite the word being the property of Macdonald Tobacco. However, with the Labatt sponsorship came some changes to the event, such as adding a new championship trophy and adding a TV-friendly playoff round after the round robin games. Labatt remained the title sponsor until 2001 when Nokia took over. That sponsorship only lasted four years before Tim Hortons took over, until 2024. When the Labatt sponsorship ended, the original Brier trophy was brought back and the names of the winners during the Labatt era were engraved on it.

Beginning in the 1990s, curling became more profitable, and the event would mostly be held in larger curling friendly markets (such as Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg and Saskatoon). At the same time, the World Curling Tour made the sport more lucrative, and curlers demanded cash prizes at the Brier, and the ability to display their sponsors on their jerseys. The Canadian Curling Association ignored their demands, and when the Grand Slam curling series was instituted in 2001, many of the top teams in the country boycotted the Brier in favour of playing in the Slams. Curlers' demands were eventually met and the boycott ended in 2003. The dominant Brier team of the era, the "Ferbey four" did not boycott the Brier, and won four of five Briers during the era, while other top teams such as Kevin Martin's boycotted the event.

Sponsors
For the first fifty years, the Brier was sponsored by Macdonald Tobacco (later RJR Tobacco Company and now part of JTI-Macdonald Corporation). The name "Brier", in fact, came from a brand of tobacco being manufactured by Macdonald at the time (a brier being a small shrub whose roots are commonly used to make tobacco pipes). Macdonald was also responsible for introducing both the Brier Tankard trophy (originally named the British Consols Trophy after a brand of cigarettes), and the now famous heart-shaped patches awarded to the tournament winners. The patches were modeled after a small tin heart pressed into the centre of Macdonald tobacco plugs, along with the slogan “The Heart of the Tobacco.” The same heart appeared on tins of Macdonald pipe tobacco. Later, when other national championships were developed, many took the heart as their identifying symbol as well.

Qualification and eligibility
The Brier is currently contested by 18 teams. Most provinces and territories are represented by one team, with the exception of Ontario, which sends two teams (named Ontario and Northern Ontario). Through 2014 the territories sent one team, but starting in 2015 all three territories were permitted to compete individually. Teams qualify for the Brier through their respective provincial championships, which are held every year and are open to any Canadian men's curling team consisting of Canadian citizens. The formats for these championships vary from province to province, but most entail a series of club, municipal, district and/or regional playdowns prior to the provincial championship. Playdown formats vary, with each member association choosing a format suited to its geography and demographics. Originally, nearly all teams regardless of ability or past performance had to qualify for each Brier, starting at the club level when more than one team from a club seeks to enter the playdowns. Today, member associations typically grant past champions and other strong teams automatic entry to the latter stage(s) of the playdowns.

Until 2013, the champions of the Brier did not automatically qualify for the following year's Brier, and had to qualify again. However, beginning in 2014, following the precedent set by its women's counterpart, the Scotties Tournament of Hearts, champions now earn a bye representing Canada during the following year's Brier.

For the three tournaments from 2015 to 2017, fifteen teams (ten provinces, three territories, Northern Ontario, and Team Canada) competed for twelve places in the Brier proper. The four lowest-ranked regions played a pre-qualifying tournament to open the Brier, with the winner advancing to the full round-robin. In this format's first year Nunavut declined to send a team, and the round was between the winners of Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and the Yukon.

Beginning with the 2018 Brier, the event expanded to a sixteen team field, with the ten provinces, three territories, Northern Ontario, and Team Canada being joined by the highest-ranked non-qualified team on the Canadian Team Ranking System standings. The teams are separated into two pools of eight, each playing a round-robin, with the top four teams in each pool advancing to a second pool to determine the final four teams.

Top 3 finishes table
As of the 2024 Brier Final

Prior to the 2011 Brier, there were no bronze medal games, so the third-place finishes listed in the table are for the teams that finished third in the tournament. Following the introduction of bronze medal games, which were played between the loser of the 3 versus 4 page playoff game and the loser of the semifinal game, the third-place finishes listed are for the teams that won the bronze medal games in each Brier. The bronze medal games were discontinued with the 2018 Brier.

Most Brier wins as skip
Only one skip, Brad Gushue, has won the Brier six times (2017, 2018, 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024).

Four people have won the Brier four times as skip:
 * Ernie Richardson (1959, 1960, 1962, 1963)
 * Kevin Martin (1991, 1997, 2008, 2009)
 * Randy Ferbey (2001, 2002, 2003, 2005)
 * Kevin Koe (2010, 2014, 2016, 2019)

Perfect games
A perfect game in curling is one in which a player scores 100% on all their shots in a game. Statistics on shots have been kept since 1980 (except for 1982).

Number of games played
As of the 2024 Brier

Most Brier game wins as skip
On March 5, 2018 Brad Gushue skipped the 114th win of his Brier career, breaking a three-way tie with previous record-holders Russ Howard and Kevin Martin. His first victory took place on March 1, 2003, 15 years earlier.

title: The Brier