Bringing in Celtic-influenced rockers wasn't popular with some of the games' older fans, but Murray said the move was necessary to attract younger crowds. And if the younger fans come for the rock bands, they have the opportunity to hear traditional Celtic music as well, he said.
"In order to keep things going, we have to bring the younger generation in," Murray said. "At some point, the older generation will be gone, and we'll be relying on the younger fans to keep things going."
Because this is the 50th time the games have been held at Grandfather Mountain, organizers are expecting a larger than usual turnout for the four-day event. The biggest crowd probably will attend Saturday, said Harris Prevost, one of the games' directors. Around 15,000 people usually attend the Saturday events, but as many as 25,000 could show up this year, he said.
Cabers and Racers
Besides familiar track and field competitions, the crowds will see uniquely Scottish events such as the caber toss.
For the uninitiated: The caber toss is a contest in which brawny men flip 21-foot (6.4-meter) wooden poles weighing hundreds of pounds end over end. If you imagine that the brawny man is standing in the center of a clock face looking toward the number 12, the objective of the caber toss is to make the pole land so that it's pointing exactly at high noon.
Putting the pole squarely on the imaginary 12 is extremely difficult, however. Sometimes years pass before a contestant nails a caber toss with a perfect landing. More likely, a contestant who can get his caber to point to 11 or 1 on the imaginary clock will win.
"It requires coordination and accuracy," said Ross Morrison of Harrisburg, North Carolina, president of the games' board of directors. "You've got to be a good athlete to win it."
About 400 runners are expected for the Highland Games Marathon, one of the most grueling marathons in the U.S. The race begins in the college town of Boone, North Carolina—elevation 3,266 feet (995 meters)—and continues 26 miles (42 kilometers) up a twisting mountain road to McRae Meadow at the foot of Grandfather Mountain. When the runners reach the finish, they've climbed about 1,000 feet (305 meters) into the mountains.
Tradition of Competition
Scottish athletes have been gathering for competition for hundreds of years. Donald MacDonald, a former Charlotte newspaper reporter who helped organize the first Grandfather Mountain games, wrote in an online history of the games that some researchers think the first Scottish highland games were held in the 11th century. Others think the games may date back even earlier.
The first recorded caber toss competition was in 1574, MacDonald noted.
Contests among musicians playing the bagpipes, Gaelic harp, and other instruments also date back centuries. The first bagpipe-playing contest was held in 1781, when highlanders came down to the Scottish Lowlands to play at a cattle fair, MacDonald wrote.
The tradition of staging competitions at cattle fairs continued when Scottish immigrants came to North Carolina in the 18th century. The newcomers felt at home in the North Carolina mountains, and descendants of these pioneers continued to speak Gaelic into the early 20th century.
The Grandfather Mountain Highland Games was the brainchild of Agnes McRae Morton, whose family founded Linville in 1892. Morton was thinking about organizing a Scottish festival when a cousin sent her a newspaper clipping about a highland games event in Connecticut.
Morton contacted MacDonald, and their collaboration produced the first Grandfather Mountain Highland Games in 1956.
Willie Drye is the author of Storm of the Century: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, published by National Geographic Books.
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