Give Her Six: A Distillery Manager’s Son in 1960’s Bruichladdich

Graham Logie was brought up in Bruichladdich in the 1960s. This book tells how, as the Distillery Manager’s son, he saw village life, and the special access he had to the distillery.

The 1960s probably saw one of the biggest changes to island life when the constant stream of supplies provided by much-loved cargo boats, mailboats and puffers, was replaced by roll-on/roll-off ferries, virtually overnight. Many tales involve boats, lorries and the sea, and show how different a child’s upbringing was then, compared to today’s technological age.

Inspired one day, when asked what it was like to be brought up on a small island, Graham decided to record his thoughts and memories as they shouldn’t be lost to the island.

Many tales describe what he and his peers did in their childhood within the village, and periodically Graham digresses to explain how people, boats etc, turned up again later in his life.

Concluding the book by comparing life in a distillery in the 1960s, to life 35 years later when he returned to Islay in 2006, as a Distillery Manager himself (albeit on the ‘wrong’ side of the island); Graham has given a very personal account of island life through a boy’s eyes and his affection for Islay and Bruichladdich in particular are evident throughout.