Haggis
Child
Haggis
Child
At
the age of five, Heather Preston was the “Haggis Child”
at the Anniversary Dinner of the St. Andrew Society. The year
was 1937 and Heather was a dancing student of Mr. Dewar who
she remembers as having a wooden leg. The Chicago Herald and
Examiner described the event: “Amid the shrilling of
bagpipes and the beating of drums the traditional Scottish
dish of haggis was served to 1,500 members of the Illinois
St. Andrews Society last night in the Stevens Hotel...tartans
and plaids of all the Scottish clans were displayed at the
banquet tables.
Many
of the guests wore Highland colors. Sprigs of heather, received
during the week from Loch Lomond, were in every buttonhole.”
In 1951, when Heather Preston was chosen as the Heather Queen,
she was a student at the Art Institute of Chicago. She remembers
that the publicity photos were taken at the Art Institute
and that she was interviewed on a daytime television show.
Her crown was made entirely of heather. She wore a dress of
white tulle that was decorated with white feathers. The dress
was made by her mother, who referred to herself as “The
Queen Mother.” (Her mother now enjoys good health, living
in a retirement complex in Dayton, Ohio.) Prior to the Dinner,
Heather had been entertained in the Conrad Hilton penthouse.
“All very posh,” she remembers. At the Dinner
she was crowned by Mr. Joseph M. Jardine.
Her
father, James Robertson Preston, was born in Edinburgh, Scotland.
He was a graduate of the Harriet Watts College at the University
of Edinburgh. As a naval architect, he was brought to the
United States to “spur on the ship building industry”
as the world prepared for World War I. Heather describes her
father as a “poet, thinker, musician, good man, Mason,
composer, proud, careful, storyteller (aren’t all Scots).”
For
many years he was the organist at the Methodist Church in
Glencoe, Illinois. He was a Life Member of the Society and
also served as the Society’s Bard. We often use his
writings in the program book of the Anniversary Dinner. After
graduating from the Art Institute with “honors and special
distinction” Heather studied and traveled in Europe.
Returning to Chicago, she taught drawing and painting and
was represented by a leading Chicago gallery.
She
was exhibited widely and was named one of the outstanding
artists of Chicago before moving to San Francisco and becoming
an award-winning illustrator. The list of her awards are too
numerous to mention but a list of her clients include: Quaker
Oats, Frito-Lay, U.S. Dept. Of Forestry (1986 Smokey Bear
poster), Pacific Bell, Bon Appetit, Prentice Hall, McGraw
Hill, Wadsworth, Addison Wesley and Scott Foresman. Her published
works include: Rod McKuen’s Book of Days, Remember the
Secret, Light Style, A Leaf from French Eddy, Laughing Down
Lonely Canyons, Kinship With All Life.
