Director: Jan Nimmo (50 mins)
About this film
When my father, ex- Argyll Colliery worker Neil Nimmo, died I had a lot of answered questions – the kind she should have asked but didn’t – and my loss made me curious to find out more about the place where her father had worked until she was four years old. The site of the mine is now a caravan park, set back from the spectacular Machrihanish Bay on Kintyre’s western shore, and almost no physical traces of its existence remain. Over the course of three years I sought out the remaining men who had worked alongside her father to piece together the story of Scotland’s most remote coal mine. This unique and fragile piece of oral history is a tribute to all the men who worked there. The film has a been a very personal piece of work for me as this was my way of mourning for my father.
Neil Nimmo and his catch from “The Backs” Water (The Machirhanish Water) which runs behind the site of the colliery. He had an audience of men from the colliery garage that day as he played the salmon…
The film was premiered at Campbeltown Picture House and subsequently shown at Document Human Rights Film Festival in Glasgow, at Cine de Granada in Spain and there have been various community screenings including a very special screening and Céilidh at Machrihanish Village Hall with the contributors and their families… Sadly some of the contributors have died both during the making of and since finishing the film; Willie McKinlay, Jim Fowler, John Anderson, Campbell Maloney and Dennis McWhirter.
The film and is dedicated to the memory of my father and his twin brother, Ramsay.
If you would like to arrange community screening of this film contact me via the blog or my website. http://www.jannimmo.com
Jan Nimmo 
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