This is one of several articles written by Louis Stott who generously offered local aspects of his scholarship to the archive of Loch Ard Local History Group–our thanks to Louis and his family for this material.

  1^st January, 1693 Rob Roy MacGregor and Helen Mary MacGregor are married at Corriearklet. 

21st January, 2000 Scotland’s first National Park launched at Aberfoyle.

13th February, 1671 Baptism of Alexander Graham of Duchray at which there took place a notorious affray at the Bridge in Aberfoyle when the impoverished Earl of Airth attempted to recover money owed to him by Thomas Graham of Duchray.

 15th February, 1819   Walter Scott attends a performance of Rob Roy at Edinburgh Theatre Royal. The part of Bailie Nicol Jarvie is played by Charles Mackay, the original of ‘the real Mackay’.

 15th February  Feast Day of St Berach (d. 595). He met King Aedan (570-604) at Aberfoyle. A hiring fair held in Aberfoyle was known as Feill Barachan .

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  7^th March, 1671 Rob Roy Macgregor is baptised, in Buchanan parish, Stirlingshire.

 12^th March, 1753 Dr. Archibald Cameron, the famous Jacobite, in Scotland to promote another revolt, is apprehended between Inversnaid and Balquhidder, probably at Brenachoil.  

 20^th March, 1936 R. B. Cunninghame Graham, local laird, politician and author, dies in Buenos Aires.

  25^th March, 1425 James I orders the arrest of Murdoch Stewart, Duke of Albany who built a retreat at Dundochil, Loch Ard.

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5th April, 1794 Susanna Blamire, the Cumberland poetess who was a regular visitor to Rednock and wrote several famous Scottish songs, dies at Carlisle, aged 46.

18th April, 1936   Robert Bontine Cunningham Graham is buried, Inchmahome, where his funeral oration was delivered by William Power, the literary critic.

26th April, 1930 Memorial to William Smith, of Falkirk, a member of the Glasgow Orpheus Choir, unveiled by Ramsay Macdonald (1866-1937), then Prime Minister.

April 1949 Launch, at a Conference in Aberfoyle, of the Scottish National Covenant.

   8^th May, 1810 Scott’s Lady of the Lake published.

 14th May, 1692 Reverend Robert Kirk, Minister at Aberfoyle, supposedly spirited away by fairies.

  27th May, 1998 Magnus Magnusson, Chairman of Scottish Natural Heritage, opens the Trossachs Visitor Centre, Aberfoyle.

 2nd June 1958 Queen Elizabeth Forest Park opened on the fifth anniversary of the Queen’s Coronation.

  9^th June 1806 The first hint of The Lady of the Lake comes in a letter to Lady Abercorn in which Scott talks of ‘a Highland romance of Love Magic and War’.

3^rd July 1857   Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864), the American novelist, serving as American consul in Liverpool, visits Inversnaid, Loch Lomond.

24^th July 1912 Lucy Maud Montgomery,   the Canadian author of Anne of Green Gables travelled from Inversnaid to Stronachlachar in one of the four-in-hand coaches. 

25th July, 1990 Mairi Hedderwick, retracing the footsteps of the artist J.T.Reid for her book Highland Journey, visits Strathard.

31st July, 1814 William Wordsworth, with his sister Mary and Sarah Hutchinson visit Aberfoyle.

8^th to 13^th August, 1792 Joseph Farington, artist, visits Strathard.

 17th August, 1654 General Monck, encamped at Aberfoyle, writes to Cromwell describing how he was destroying the place because it had harboured enemy troops during the Earl of Glencairn’s Rising.

  2nd September, 1869 Queen Victoria visits Loch Ard from Invertrossachs.

  4th September, 1835 Patrick Graham, Minister of Aberfoyle and learned author of Sketches of  Perthshire dies.

 12th September, 1803 William Wordsworth visits what he believes to be ‘Rob Roy’s Grave’ at the head of Loch Katrine, the subject of one of his worst poems.

 24^th September, 1973 Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, at Aberfoyle to mark the planting of a million acres of trees in Scotland.

 28^th September, 1881 Gerard Manley Hopkins visits Inversnaid, Loch Lomond, and is inspired to write the most famous of all waterfall poems.  

 29th September, 1951 Last train runs to Aberfoyle from Glasgow Queen Street.

  1st October 1882 Railway line from Buchlyvie to Aberfoyle opens.

  7th October 1876 The death takes place at Dundarach, Aberfoyle of the painter Thomas Clark ARSA (1820-76). His works included ‘A Lowering Day, Loch Achray’ (1862), ‘Waiting for the Ferry,’ (1865), and  ‘Ben Venue, Loch Achray’ (1869).

 11th October, 1489 Sir John Stewart, Earl of Lennox raised a revolt against James 1V. He encamped at Gartalunane [Gartloaning], but during the night he was surprised and completely routed by John Drummond for the King. (Battle of Tullymoss).

 14th October, 1859 Queen Victoria opens the Loch Katrine Water Works.

  3rd November, 1814 William Richardson, poet and Professor of Humanities at Glasgow University (born 1^st Oct 1743) dies, unmarried.

  14th November, 1789 William Glen (1789-1826), poet, is born in Queen Street, Glasgow. He will write the lament ‘Wae’s me for Prince Charlie’ and occupy Craigie Cottage, Aberfoyle where, after his death, his wife will keep an orphanage at the cottage.

  16th November, 1775 Nicol Graham of Gartmore, laird and author of a notable account of the state of the Highlands in Rob Roy’s day, dies.

  4th December, 1797 Death of Robert Graham (1735-1797) author of ‘If Doughty Deeds My Lady Please’.

  9th December, 1644 Robert Kirk, who is to become the ‘fairy minister’ of Aberfoyle, is born, the seventh son of Rev. James Kirk and Elisabeth Carcattell.

 28th December, 1734   Rob Roy MacGregor dies, and is buried in the churchyard of Balquhidder.

 31st December, 1817 Scott’s Rob Roy published.