“This gift of $103,000 will be added to a $25,000 endowment fund the donors already have in place to underwrite the Scottish Heritage Symposium Weekend in perpetuity,” said Scottish Heritage Center director Bill Caudill. “We are pleased to rename the annual March event, formerly known as ‘Our Scottish Heritage,’ to the Charles Bascombe Shaw Memorial Scottish Heritage Symposium in memory of Frank’s father.”
“It is generosity such as this,” said St. Andrews President, John Deegan, “that builds an institution like St. Andrews. People committed to excellence in every aspect of an institution’s life lead the institution to a future in which everyone can flourish. St. Andrews’ Scottish Heritage Center is a prime example. I am grateful to Frank and Susan Shaw for enabling the College to continue to celebrate the substantial contributions our Scottish ancestors made to our region’s identity — for it is when we fully understand our history that we can move with tenacious confidence into our future.”
Frank and Susan Shaw are active philanthropists who are interested in genealogy and Scottish history. “My ancestors came from the Isle of Jura, off the coast of Argyll, to North Carolina during the 1750s,” Shaw said. “My family ended up in Bladen County and later in the Laurel Hill Township. My grandfather, John W. Shaw, was a Civil War veteran who was captured at Fort Fisher and imprisoned as a prisoner of war at Elmira, N.Y., until the end of the war.”
Frank R. Shaw’s family moved to Mullins, S.C., around the time of the Great Depression. He earned degrees from North Greenville Junior College, Furman University and Southeastern at Wake Forest. He has been involved in long–term health care management for the past 33 years. “I grew up dirt-poor, and I know what it is like to do without,”he said. In fact, as a young teenager in Mullins, the only money we had was the monthly state welfare check,” Shaw said. “I was the 10th of ten children and the only one of the bunch fortunate enough to get a college education.”
Shaw’s wife, Susan, recently retired after 35 years with The Coca–Cola Co. in Atlanta, the last 14 of which were serving as corporate secretary of the company. She worked with the Board of Directors, reported to four chairmen, managed logistics for domestic and international meetings and maintained all corporate records. “Though her ancestors hail from Sussex, England, going back to the 16th century,” Shaw said, “she has taken great delight in attending and assisting with the Clan Chattan tent over the years at Highland Games in South Carolina, North Carolina and Georgia, proudly wearing her Shaw tartan, as a matter of choice.”
Appointed by his chief, John Shaw of Tordarroch, Frank Shaw has served as Clan Shaw High Commissioner of the United States and Mexico and is currently a trustee in Clan Chattan (USA). He has also served as editor of the award–winning “Clach Na Faire,” the newsletter of the Clan Shaw. Shaw writes regular columns titled “A Highlander and His Books,” “A Chat with the Author,” and “Robert Burns Lives!” for The Family Tree genealogical newspaper with a 70,000-plus circulation. The Shaws enjoy socializing with their Scottish “cousins” in both the St. Andrew’s Society of Atlanta and the Burns Club of Atlanta and have made 13 trips to Scotland since they began the quest regarding their ancestry.
The Shaws decided nearly 30 years ago that they would one day give something back to society to help others through worthy causes and great institutions. They have endowed scholarships at North Greenville College and Furman University. At each institution, there is an individual who greatly influenced their gifts. At North Greenville, it was Dr. M.C. Donnan, At Furman, it is Dr. avid Shi, At St. Andrews, it is Bill Caudill. “Susan and I want to personally thank Bill Caudill for the positive influence he exhibits as a representative of the Scottish Heritage Center, prompting us to make this donation to St. Andrews. Shaw said.
The Scottish Heritage Center sponsors the annual Scottish Heritage Symposium at St. Andrews. The event, founded in 1989 and first held in Fayetteville, celebrates the 250th anniversary of the arrival of the first Highlanders to settle in North Carolina — the “Argyll Colony.” The Upper Cape Fear region became the primary destination of Highland Scot emigrants in the latter decades of the 18th century and the early 19th century.
Providing a forum for information on the early Highland emigrants to North Carolina, the symposium was moved from Fayetteville to the St. Andrews Presbyterian College campus in Laurinburg in 1994. Penny Geffert, former college archivist, and Caudill, a student who went on to become director of the college’s Scottish Heritage projects, represented St. Andrews on the founding committee and have been instrumental in its continued success. The event brings historians, folklorists and genealogists together from the United States, Scotland and Canada. The only event of its kind in the United States, it is also the occasion of the Scottish Heritage Awards Ceremonies.
“This gracious gift the Shaws have given the College will ensure that this important celebration of our Scottish heritage will continue to flourish,” Caudill said. “We are, indeed, grateful and pleased to announce March 21-23 as the dates for the 2003 Charles Bascombe Shaw Memorial Scottish Heritage Symposium.”
