The Broons: National Library of Scotland makes amends over historic snub to country's first family – Scotsman comment

Deciding not to secure the first ever Broon annual in 1939 was surely comparable to a music industry executive’s decision to turn down The Beatles

The first edition of The Broons annual, which was published in 1939, along with the more recent compilation.

It’s said to be as rare as the Gutenberg Bible – the first book ever published in Europe – and is “one of the most important publications in Scotland”, no less. However, when it was first published, the National Library of Scotland appears to have dismissed it as a “passing fad” of no cultural importance and sniffily decided not to buy a copy.

This extraordinary lack of judgment – surely comparable to the music label which turned down The Beatles – has now been rectified with the first-ever annual compilation of comic strip The Broons, from 1939, finally being secured for the nation. If that’s not a belated Christmas present to us all, then “jings, crivvens, help ma boab – whit on Earth would Granpaw mak’ of it” is all we can really say.

National Library curator Ian Scott said that, in terms of cultural impact, The Broons, Oor Wullie and co are “the closest Scotland has to the characters created by Disney, Marvel and DC in America”. Batman, Wonder Woman and someone called ‘Green Lantern’ vs Maw Broon, Hen and Maggie? Nae chance.