'A Man in Moccasins'
A true story about two remarkable people.
John Maclean, a young Glaswegian shoemaker loses his mother at an early age and effectively brings up his family because his alcoholic father can’t cope. He sees his younger brothers through to maturity then breaks away to find himself on the Prairie amongst a people whose very way of life is threatened, only becoming accepted because he can make moccasins almost as well as them.
He meets Tatanga Mani, an angry young Stoney-Nakoda whose mother dies shortly after giving birth to him and is given the name Walking Buffalo because he wanders off with a herd of bison. His resentment of the situation he finds himself in and with those who he sees as fashioning it, is palpable. John adopts him in an effort to be a positive force for good and has nine children of his own.
At a time of huge societal upheaval, theirs is an adventure story of immense courage as both of them battle with questions of spirituality, environmental evolution and cultural survival. John develops into a writer and ethnographer while his adopted son becomes chief of his band travelling the globe to meet world leaders as an ambassador for peace and racial integration, both men displaying ideologies and thinking way ahead of their time.
The narrative is a unique illustration of how a family story mirrors the travails of a young nation as they both struggle to find their own identity.
