Seòras Grannd a' bruidhinnn mu phoitean-dubh a theasachadh.

Bha Seòras Grannd (1923-2002) na cheann-suidhe air Taigh-Staile Gleann Farghlais ri taobh Abhainn Spè fad lethcheud bliadhna 's a dhà. Cheannaich a shinnsear, Iain Grannd, an taigh-staile ann an 1865, agus tha e air a bhith aig an teaghlach Grannd on uair sin. 'S e Iain L S Grannd, mac Sheòrais, an ceann-suidhe aige an-dràsta. Anns an earrainn chlaistinnich seo, a chaidh a chlàradh o thùs ann an 1983 do 'Mhoray Firth People', tha Seòras a' bruidhinn ri Sam Marshall mu na h-atharraichean ann an dòighean air poitean-dubh a theasachadh.<br /> <br /> Interviewer: Tell me about the heating of the still. Has that changed in any way over the years?<br /> <br /> Oh but yes. Of course. Pre-war days the stills were all coal fired by hand where, as far as we were concerned, we used to put in about twenty-five hundredweights of coal beneath the wash still before we set it alight. And we started the fire with a shovelful of blowing coals from the boiler. Now to set twenty-five hundredweights of coal alight took something like two hours. The next innovation after that were - was underfeed stokers, where you had a - not quite [?] grate but a blast like a blacksmith's forge, and the coal was fed in from underneath. There your coal became alight in something like fifteen minutes after you'd turned on the blast, and that alone cut the running time of the still by about an hour and a half. And again, the coal there was mechanically handled. The ash of course was still handled by the stillmen who had to rake it out and take it away in a barrel. We now are gas-fired, where of course we have no handling at all. And of course we have no ash or anything else to dispose of. It's merely a case of turning knobs