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Ian McDiarmid

Bryan Dick

Monica Gibb

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Iain MacRae

Robin Laing

Finn den Hertog

Kirsteen Cameron

Colin MacDonald

Roger Hutchinson

Saturday Drama: Calum's Road

Calum's Road

05/10/2013

BBC Radio 4 - Saturday Drama, Calum's Road

Drama based on the true story of one Raasay man's road-building feat. Ian McDiarmid stars.

Ian McDiarmid stars in this atmospheric drama based on the true story of a man who built a two-mile road by hand on the Scottish island of Raasay, off the east coast of Skye.

Ian McDiarmid leads this drama inspired by the extraordinary true story of how, over a period of ten years, one man built two miles of road by hand (including passing places) on the Scottish island of Raasay, which lies just off the east coast of Skye.


Set in the 1960s and 1970s, Calum MacLeod desperately wanted to save his dying island community; with schools and medical services located more than a half day's journey away, people were finding it increasingly difficult to continue a way of life handed down to them by their ancestors.


Born in 1911, MacLeod came from a long line of tough, strong and hard-working Raasay folk. When the council repeatedly turned down his requests for a road to link the north of Raasay to the south he would not be beaten. Instead, he went to a second-hand bookshop and found a dusty volume written in 1910: "Road Making And Maintenance - A Practical Treatise for Engineers, Surveyors and Others" and his extraordinary ten year project began.


Colin MacDonald's drama is inspired by Roger Hutchinson's book of the same name.

Other parts are played by members of the cast


Dramatiser: Colin MacDonald.

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