Desperate Dan is a wild west character in the now-defunct Scottish comic magazine The Dandy. He made his appearance in the first issue which was dated 4 December 1937 and became the magazine's mascot. He is apparently the world's strongest man, able to lift a cow with one hand. The pillow of his (reinforced) bed is filled with building rubble and his beard is so tough he shaves with a blowtorch.
Scots is a language variety descended from Early Middle English in the West Germanic language family. Most commonly spoken in the Scottish Lowlands, the Northern Isles of Scotland, and northern Ulster in Ireland, it is sometimes called: Lowland Scots, to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language that was historically restricted to most of the Scottish Highlands, the Hebrides, and Galloway after the sixteenth century; or Broad Scots, to distinguish it from Scottish Standard English. Modern Scots is a sister language of Modern English, as the two diverged from the same medieval form of English.
Oor Wullie is a Scottish comic strip published in the D.C. Thomson newspaper The Sunday Post. It features a character called Wullie; Wullie is a Scots nickname for boys named William, equivalent to Willie. His trademarks are spiky hair, dungarees and an upturned bucket, which he uses as a seat: most strips since early 1937 begin and end with a single panel of Wullie sitting on his bucket. The earliest strips, with little dialogue, ended with Wullie complaining. The artistic style settled down by 1940 and has changed little since. A frequent tagline reads, "Oor Wullie! Your Wullie! A'body's Wullie!".
Lord Snooty is a fictional character who stars in the British comic strip Lord Snooty and his Pals from the British comic anthology The Beano. The strip debuted in issue 1, illustrated by DC Thomson artist Dudley D. Watkins, who designed and wrote Snooty's stories until 1968, but the stories would continue featuring in Beano issues until 1991, with occasional revivals and character cameos.
DC Thomson is a media company based in Dundee, Scotland. Founded by David Couper Thomson in 1905, it is best known for publishing The Courier, The Evening Telegraph and The Sunday Post newspapers, and the comics Oor Wullie, The Broons, The Beano, The Dandy and Commando. It also owns the Aberdeen Journals Group which publishes the Press and Journal. The company owns several websites, including Findmypast, and owned the now defunct social media site Friends Reunited.
Biffo the Bear is a fictional character from the British comic magazine The Beano who stars in the comic strip of the same name, created in 1948 by Dudley D. Watkins. He was the mascot of The Beano for several decades.
The Sunday Post is a weekly newspaper published in Dundee, Scotland, by DC Thomson, and characterised by a mix of news, human interest stories and short features. The paper was founded in 1914 and has a wide circulation across Scotland, Ulster, and parts of Northern England.
Ma and Pa Kettle are comic film characters of the successful film series of the same name, produced by Universal Studios, in the late 1940s and 1950s. “The hillbilly duo have their hands full with a ramshackle farm and a brood of rambunctious children. When the future comes a-callin' in the form of modern houses, exotic locales, and newfangled ideas, Ma and Pa must learn how to make the best of it with luck, pluck, and a little country charm.”
Dudley Dexter Watkins was an English cartoonist and illustrator. He is best known for his characters Oor Wullie and The Broons; comic strips featuring them have appeared in the Scottish newspaper The Sunday Post since 1936, along with annual compilations. Watkins also illustrated comics such as The Beano, The Dandy, The Beezer and Topper, and provided illustrations for Christian stories. Watkins was posthumously inducted into the British Comic Awards Hall of Fame in 2015.
The Grassmarket is a historic market place, street and event space in the Old Town of Edinburgh, Scotland. In relation to the rest of the city it lies in a hollow, well below surrounding ground levels.
Rev John Thomson FRSE HonRSA was a Scottish minister of the Church of Scotland and noted amateur landscape painter. He was the minister of Duddingston Kirk from 1805 to 1840.
David Couper Thomson DL was a newspaper proprietor and founder of the newspaper and publishing company D. C. Thomson & Co. Ltd in Dundee, Scotland.
Colonel Brian Harold Thomson was a newspaper proprietor of D. C. Thomson & Co. and soldier in the Fife and Forfar Yeomanry. He was widely known as "Mr Brian" within D. C. Thomson & Co. and throughout the business community of Dundee.
Robert Duncan Low was a Scottish comics writer and editor. Employed by D. C. Thomson & Co., he was responsible for their line of comics, and, as a writer, co-created Oor Wullie and The Broons with artist Dudley D. Watkins.
Jack Flash is a British adventure story character published in the British comic magazine The Beano, first appearing in issue 355 with artwork by Dudley Watkins. He featured for almost a decade in five serials, following his time as a foreigner to Earth and living in a Cornish village.
The Legend of Barney Thomson, known in the United States as Barney Thomson, is a 2015 British comedy thriller film based on the 1999 novel The Long Midnight of Barney Thomson by Douglas Lindsay. It is the directorial debut of Robert Carlyle, who also stars in the film, alongside Emma Thompson, Ray Winstone, Ashley Jensen and Brian Pettifer. It was previewed at the 2015 Edinburgh International Film Festival in June 2015 before its release on 24 July 2015. The film also won the BAFTA Scotland Award for Best Feature Film.
