{"id":22806,"date":"2022-12-08T19:12:56","date_gmt":"2022-12-08T19:12:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/?p=22806"},"modified":"2023-03-07T19:26:34","modified_gmt":"2023-03-07T19:26:34","slug":"elaine-murray-a-remarkable-woman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/2022\/12\/08\/elaine-murray-a-remarkable-woman\/","title":{"rendered":"Elaine Murray – a remarkable woman"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elaine Murray was a remarkable woman. Being an active trade unionist and political campaigners were just two aspects of her full and rounded life. Many people – family, partners, friends, sisters, brothers and \u00a0and \u00a0comrades – attended her commemoration meeting. This was held on Thursday, December 1st in the\u00a0Kings Manor Hotel in Edinburgh. This commemoration \u00a0was addressed by her daughter, Charisse McGowan; partner, Alan McIntyre (Argyll shepherd); \u00a0Janice Donaldson (friend and \u00a0colleague at Clovenstone Primary School, former member of Lothian Rank & File Teachers – LR&FT and Scottish Federation of Socialist Teachers – SFST); Lorna Stewart (friend, former teacher at Clovenstone Primary and later headteacher at Craigroyston Primary); Myra Galletly (friend and former member of LR&FT and SFST); and\u00a0\u00a0one time partner Norrie Bissell<\/a> (writer, former \u00a0member of the SFST and EIS Area Officer). Geraldine Gould<\/a> \u00a0(friend, writer, folksinger \u00a0and former member of LR&FT and SFST) acted as the celebrant. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The following tribute in three parts consists of the portrait made by artist, Fred Crayk<\/a>, which perfectly captures Elaine’s spirit; the contribution made by Myra Galletly; and the poem read out by Norrie Bissell.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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A portrait of Elaine Murray by Fred Crayk<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

6th October 1951 – 11th November, 2022<\/strong><\/p>\n

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ELAINE – REMEMBERING \u00a0A LIFE OF RANK AND FILE TRADE UNION ACTIVISM AND COMMITMENT TO EDUCATION<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is very much a communal effort, and I\u2019m speaking on behalf of Elaine\u2019s comrades and friends in teacher politics.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Elaine first became involved at Moray House when students discovered there would be virtually no jobs for the 100s of students in training that year – and occupied the college.\u00a0 She joined the action, visiting other colleges and helping spread the action across the country.\u00a0 It was then that she met some of the left-wingers who would become long-term friends and comrades.\u00a0 She confessed later to feeling intimidated in those early years by their political knowledge \u2013 but the reality was that right from the start she had the ability to counter leftie hackishness with her characteristic no-nonsense logic.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Elaine did get a job, in Clovenstone, and soon became the rep, recruiting almost everyone to the EIS and persuading the teachers there, with the strength of her arguments, to take unofficial and then official action, and in the early days to picket WHEC, the local secondary school in Wester Hailes.\u00a0 Clovenstone became one of the best organised schools in Edinburgh, and Elaine remained an active rep \u2013 unafraid to challenge management and defend members \u2013 until she left.<\/strong><\/p>\n

When she started teaching, Elaine quickly became central to the Rank-and-File teachers\u2019 group, The Scottish Federation of Socialist Teachers, and was later a stalwart in a very right-wing Local Association in Argyll.\u00a0 In Edinburgh, she attended meetings regularly \u2013 no hard task, as they were often held in the smoke-filled back rooms of pubs (!) \u2013 wrote articles and helped organise campaigns.\u00a0 She was also active and widely respected on the Local Executive, Council and the AGM, pushing for action on a range of issues \u2013 single salary scale, class sizes, national testing and the poll tax to name a few.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Cartoon of Jim Thomson by Fred Crayk<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Elaine was an incredibly powerful speaker, particularly at AGMs.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t miss the mark in challenging the right.\u00a0 When she opposed inequality and injustice, she had lived the life, and spoke with an honesty that came from the heart.\u00a0 So, when Jim Thomson, a closet ex-communist called her a liar in front of the AGM, she was visibly distressed \u2013 but thrilled when Fred Crayk gave her a drawing of Thomson, snakes coming out of his mouth entitled \u201cThe Dirty Rotten Lying Commie Bastard\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

AGM speeches didn\u2019t come easy to her.\u00a0 She would be outside the hall, smoking, hands shaking before speaking, but she spoke with conviction, passion, and often humour.\u00a0 I remember her calling for wider action \u2013 probably all out action \u2013 referring to the \u201cmartyrs\u201d at the opposite mic who were in schools targeted for limited action and were claiming they were making sacrifices, missing school day after day on full pay while the rest of us paid for it. She threw her arms out and said, \u201cTie me to that cross!\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

All of this was underpinned by a love of learning, an appreciation of the value of education, and a powerful sense of the importance of grass roots action.\u00a0 No one could put it better than Elaine herself, so I\u2019ll finish by reading from a talk she gave to women trade unionists at Edinburgh City Chambers in 1996.\u00a0 I asked for a copy of it and have kept it ever since.<\/strong><\/p>\n

She started the talk with an exploration of grammar, which illustrates her curiosity and enthusiasm for learning:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cGrammary means magic and comes from the word grammar.\u00a0 So to have skill in grammar is to have skill in magic.\u00a0 In other words, it was seen as a source of mysterious power.\u00a0 And that was the case when only the elite had this skill in grammar.\u00a0 When everyone\u00a0 has this skill it loses its power or rather it empowers everyone.\u00a0 No wonder people were burned at the stake for printing their own versions of the bible.\u00a0 Education is power; literacy is knowledge; skill in grammar is magic!<\/strong><\/p>\n

She went on to education.\u00a0 State education has always had too strong an element of control in it.\u00a0 Why should we be teaching life skills?\u00a0 Why should we be giving young people \u201cstrategies\u201d to cope with their difficult and often desperate lives?\u00a0 We shouldn\u2019t be teaching them to come to terms with desperate prospects \u2013 we should be empowering them so that they can set about changing things.<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

I want to teach children to read critically, analytically, anything that comes their way, be it a Shakespeare play, a Maya Angelou novel or a Labour Party manifesto.\u00a0 There is a vast body of knowledge out there covering thousands of years and every corner of the globe.\u00a0 I want children to know who they are, where they are, and what forces shape their lives.\u00a0 I want to teach children to talk, argue, discuss, debate.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Then finally, after giving an account of various teacher actions she had been involved in, Elaine raised the rhetorical question \u2013 why had she not aimed for the upper ranks of teaching, the union, or politics?\u00a0 And here\u2019s her answer:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0“<\/strong>Because that\u2019s not where the struggle lies.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know anyone who has gone along any of those paths who has not had to compromise, and compromise is the deadliest path of all.\u00a0 Look at the Labour Party just now in its grubby scramble for power, Its policies – \u00a0all anti-working class in effect.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>But rank and file activity does make a difference.\u00a0 We have had an effect.\u00a0 That is why I would argue that grass roots activity, in whatever sphere it is seen to be necessary, is the most important work of women who want to be involved in the struggle.\u00a0 Build from the bottom up and refuse to compromise.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s what Elaine spent her life doing \u2013 and you only have to look around at how many of us have come here from near and far to see Elaine did have a major effect.\u00a0 She made a huge difference.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Myra Galletly, 30.11.22<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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___________\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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To A Wild-Flowering Woman*<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There goes one o\u2019 the poor wee Murrays<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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nae mair poor nor wee<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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but strong and straight<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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as her loping stride up cobbled streets.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A voice and mind sharp and clear<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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as a spring morning on Berneray<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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tracing out the land with the same bright eye<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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of an old man in Assynt.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She gave her wean all the love she\u2019d missed<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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in lonely rooms those small hands twisting papers<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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to set in cold black grates<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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no fires burn like hers.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She lives in a place<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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where others cannot reach<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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and only truth can grow<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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where else is there to be?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A wild-flowering woman<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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who welcomes foxes into her garden<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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and likes nothing better than to sit here<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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with green-growing life in bloom like her own. <\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Norman Bissell<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n