====== MacLennan, Malcolm ====== (22 May 1862-1 Sept. 1931), clergyman and author. Born at Uig, Lewis Island, Outer Hebrides, Scotland, the son of a crofter. Parents: Angus MacLennan and his wife Ann Buchanan. Soon after coming to Canada, he began to attend McGill University (B. A., 1887, B. D., 1888, D. D., 1915), and he also attended Presbyterian College, Montreal. He was ordained a clergyman in the Presbyterian Church. He was the minister of the Gordon Church at St. Elmo, Glengarry County, from 1888 to 1891, and of the West Church, Kirk Hill, from 1891 to 1896. When the Montreal //Daily Witness//, a strongly temperance newspaper, honoured the Lochiel centenary of 1894, its reporter wrote that, “Mr. McLennan seems to be an ideal pastor. Alert, vigorous, practical, his neighbours vote him a splendid fellow, and the men who worked with him last winter in the plebiscite campaign pronounce him a power in the temperance work. Your correspondent had the pleasure of taking tea with him and his talented wife in their beautiful home beside the church. We discussed the coming centenary celebration, at which he is to be one of the speakers, and, of course, we discussed it in the light of the progress of the temperance sentiment in the county. It will be a splendid chance, he said, to give a temperance address. Evidently in his estimation there is much yet to be done in that line. ‘By the way,’ he said, ‘the Witness is doing splendid work in rooting out the gamblers in Montreal. We could not do without the Witness’.” He obtained leave of absence in March 1896 to revisit Scotland, and while in Scotland he received a call from Free St. Columba’s Church, Edinburgh, a church where Gaelic was used. He was inducted as minister of Free St. Columba’s Church on 14 Jan. 1897. In 1900 he and virtually the whole of his congregation became members of the newly formed United Free Church, and his congregation became known as that of St. Columba’s United Free Church. A stormy period in his life followed, when dissident members of the Free Church successfully claimed the actual church building at law and his congregation, for a time, had to vacate it. Altogether, he was pastor from 1897 to 1931 of this Edinburgh congregation, which in 1929 became part of the Church of Scotland. The Edinburgh Church which at the end of the 20th century was known by the name of Free St. Columba’s was not the one in which he preached, and its congregation continued the tradition of the people who refused to join the United Free Church in 1900. The Rev. Malcolm MacLennan revisited GC at least twice, in 1907 and 1914. He published a Gaelic tribute to one of his successors at Kirk Hill West Church (see Allan Morrison). On the occasion of the diamond jubilee, in 1924, of the St. Elmo Church, he wrote the Rev. G. Watt Smith a long, interesting letter which included many recollections of the strong-charactered, remarkable people he had known at St. Elmo. He died at a nursing home in Edinburgh, Scotland (two children) A linguist of considerable accomplishments, and fluent in Gaelic, he was the author of //A Pronouncing and Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language: Gaelic-English: English-Gaelic// (Edinburgh, John Grant, 1925; pp. xv, 613). A review (length: about eighteen column inches) in the //Times Literary Supplement// (1925 p. 238) criticized the book sharply, citing many faults. Among much else, the reviewer was troubled by what he saw as MacLennan’s reliance on literary and bookish Gaelic words, at the expense of the language as people actually spoke it. The unsympathetic reviewer, anonymous by the custom of the //Times Literary Supplement// at that time, was John Fraser (1882-18 May 1945). Fraser, born at Inverness, Scotland, was a fellow of Jesus College, Oxford, and Jesus professor of Celtic. Malcolm MacLennan was the author also of //The Gaelic Reader// (1913) and //Handbook of Gaelic Phrases// (1930, 1939, 1949). He edited the revision of the Gaelic Bible in 1911. During the First World War, he was involved in preparing Gaelic translations of religious tracts for distribution to soldiers. His many contributions to the survival of the Gaelic language involved the editing of Gaelic periodicals and Gaelic supplements to English-language periodicals. In 1979 a Scottish bilingual publishing company called Acair, and the Aberdeen University Press, acting jointly, reissued the dictionary in a photolithographic reproduction of the first edition. There has been at least one further reprint, by Acair and Mercat, in Edinburgh, 1995. While minister at St. Elmo, he was married 6 Nov. 1889 to Catherine Link, who predeceased him. Her aunt was the wife of Dr Donald MacDiarmid. ---- Death notices in //Edinburgh Evening Dispatch// and //Scotsman//, both of 3 Sept. 1931 * //Cornwall Standard //8 Oct. 1931 (mostly from //Montreal Gazette//), //Glengarry News// 11 Dec. 1931 * biog. sketch in John Alexander Lamb, //Fasti of the United Free Church of Scotland 1900-1929// (Edinburgh, 1956) * MacMillan, //Kirk//, 141, 188-189 * Maurice Grant, //Free St Columba’s: a History of Congregation and Church// (1991) * //Witness// 4 Sept. 1894 (includes a fine, expressive line portrait) * //Maxville (1967) //30-32 (text of the 1924 letter) * his visit to St. Elmo and Kirk Hill recalled, 20 Years Ago column, //Cornwall Freeholder// 25 Aug. 1927 * his dictionary remembered: //GN// 21 July 1999 (Ken McKenna), //Times Literary Supplement// 13 Feb. 2004 (V. Price) *John Fraser: //Who Was Who 1941-1950// [U. K.] 407; his name, as author of review, from //Times Literary Supplement// records [<6>]