Scottish American

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Scottish American
Ameireaganaich Albannach
Total population
Scottish Americans
Up to 8.3% of the U.S. population
Scotch-Irish Americans
27 to 30 million[5][6]
Up to 10% of the U.S. population
5,827,046 (Self-reported only, 2008)
1.9% of the total U.S. population[7]
Regions with significant populations
Appalachia, New England
Southern United States
American English
Presbyterianism, Baptist, Pentecostalism, Methodist and Roman Catholicism
Related ethnic groups
British Americans (Cornish Americans · Scotch-Irish Americans · English Americans · Welsh Americans) · Irish Americans[8]

Scottish Americans or Scots Americans (Scottish Gaelic: Ameireaganaich Albannach) are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly in Scotland. Scottish Americans are closely related to Scotch-Irish Americans, descendants of Ulster Scots, and communities emphasize and celebrate a common heritage.[9] The majority of Scotch-Irish originally came from Lowland Scotland and Northern England before migrating to the province of Ulster in Ireland (see Plantation of Ulster) and thence, beginning about five generations later, to North America in large numbers during the eighteenth century.

In the 2009 US Community Census Survey, 6.85 million Americans self-identified as having solely Scottish ancestry. 27.5 million Americans reported Scottish ancestry either alone, or in combination with another nationality. Although the northern states have a healthy population of Scottish-Americans, the majority of those claiming Scottish descent reside in southern states such as North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Kentucky, and Tennessee.

Historical contributions[edit]







James VI and I, c. 1604.
The Americas in the reign of James VI, 1619.

After the Union of the Crowns of Scotland and England in 1603, King James VI, a Scot, promoted joint expeditions overseas, and became the founder of English America.[17] The first permanent English settlement in the Americas, Jamestown, was thus named for a Scot.

The earliest Scottish communities in America were formed by traders and planters rather than farmer settlers.[18] The hub of Scottish commercial activity in the colonial period was Virginia. Regular contacts began with the transportation of indentured servants to the colony from Scotland, including prisoners taken in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.[19]

By the 1670s Glasgow was the main outlet for Virginian tobacco, in open defiance of English restrictions on colonial trade; in return the colony received Scottish manufactured goods, immigrants and ideas.[19][20] In the 1670s and 1680s Presbyterian Dissenters fled persecution by the Royalist privy council in Edinburgh to settle in South Carolina and New Jersey, where they maintained their distinctive religious culture.[19]

Trade between Scotland and the American colonies was finally regularized by the parliamentary Act of Union of Scotland and England in 1707. Population growth and the commercialization of agriculture in Scotland encouraged mass emigration to America after the French and Indian War,[21] a conflict which had also seen the first use of Scottish Highland regiments as Indian fighters.[19]

More than 50,000 Scots, principally from the west coast,[19] settled in the Thirteen Colonies between 1763 and 1776, the majority of these in their own communities in the South,[21] especially North Carolina, although Scottish individuals and families also began to appear as professionals and artisans in every American town.[19] Scots arriving in Florida and the Gulf Coast traded extensively with Native Americans.[22]

Folk and Gospel music[edit]

American bluegrass and folk music styles have roots in the Appalachian ballad culture of Scottish Americans and the Scotch-Irish.


The first foreign tongue spoken by some slaves in America was Scottish Gaelic picked up from Gaelic-speakers from the Western Isles.[23] In a North Carolina newspaper dated about 1740, an advertisement offers a generous reward for the capture and return of a runaway African slave who is described as being easy to identify because he only spoke Gaelic.[24] In one church in Alabama the African American congregation worshiped in Gaelic as late as 1918, another indication of the extent to which the Highlanders and Islanders spread their culture, from North Carolina to Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi.[25]

Patriots and Loyalists[edit]

The civic tradition of the Scottish Enlightenment contributed to the intellectual ferment of the American Revolution.[19] In 1740, the Glasgow philosopher Francis Hutcheson argued for a right of colonial resistance to tyranny.[26] Scotland's leading thinkers of the revolutionary age, David Hume and Adam Smith, opposed the use of force against the rebellious colonies.[27] According to the historian Arthur Herman: “Americans built their world around the principles of Adam Smith and Thomas Reid, of individual interest governed by common sense and a limited need for government.”[28]

Nineteen of the fifty-six delegates who signed the Declaration of Independence came from Scotland or Ulster or, like the Scottish-tutored Thomas Jefferson, had ancestors there.[29] Other Founding Fathers like James Madison had no ancestral connection but were imbued with ideas drawn from Scottish moral philosophy.[30] Scottish Americans who made major contributions to the revolutionary war included Commodore John Paul Jones, the "Father of the American Navy", and Generals Henry Knox and William Alexander. Another person of note was personal friend of George Washington, General Hugh Mercer, who fought for Charles Edward Stuart at the Battle of Culloden.

The Scotch-Irish, who had already begun to settle beyond the Proclamation Line in the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys, were drawn into rebellion as war spread to the frontier.[31] Tobacco plantations and independent farms in the backcountry of Virginia, Maryland and the Carolinas had been financed with Scottish credit, and indebtedness was an additional incentive for separation.[18]

Most Scottish Americans had commercial ties with the old country or clan allegiances and stayed true to the Crown.[32] The Scottish Highland communities of upstate New York and the Cape Fear valley of North Carolina were centers of Loyalist resistance.[19] A small force of Loyalist Highlanders fell at the Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge in 1776. Scotch-Irish Patriots defeated Scottish American Loyalists in the Battle of Kings Mountain in 1780.[33] Many Scottish American Loyalists emigrated to Canada after the war.[19]

Uncle Sam[edit]

Uncle Sam was based on Samuel Wilson


Immigrants and free traders[edit]


Emigration from Scotland peaked in the nineteenth century, when more than a million Scots left for the United States,[35] taking advantage of the regular Atlantic steam-age shipping industry which was itself largely a Scottish creation,[36] contributing to a revolution in transatlantic communication.[19]

Scottish emigration to the United States followed, to a lesser extent, during the twentieth century, when Scottish heavy industry declined.[37] This new wave peaked in the first decade of the twentieth century, contributing to a hard life for many who remained behind. Many qualified workers emigrated overseas, a part of which, established in Canada, later went on to the United States.[38]


In the nineteenth century, American authors and educators adopted Scotland as a model for cultural independence.[19] In the world of letters, Scottish literary icons James Macpherson, Robert Burns, Walter Scott, and Thomas Carlyle had a mass following in the United States, and Scottish Romanticism exerted a seminal influence on the development of American literature.[19] The works of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathaniel Hawthorne bear its powerful impression. Among the most notable Scottish American writers of the nineteenth century were Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper, Edgar Allan Poe and Herman Melville. William Faulkner won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1949.

Soldiers and statesmen[edit]


Other Scotch-Irish presidents included James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Chester Alan Arthur, William McKinley and Richard M. Nixon. Ulysses S. Grant, Theodore Roosevelt (through his mother), Woodrow Wilson, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Ronald Reagan were of Scottish descent.[39] By one estimate, 75% of U.S. presidents could claim some Scottish ancestry.[40]


Douglas MacArthur and George Marshall upheld the martial tradition in the twentieth century. Grace Murray Hopper, a rear admiral and computer scientist, was the oldest officer and highest-ranking woman in the U.S. armed forces on her retirement at the age of 80 in 1986.[42] Isabella Cannon, the former Mayor of Raleigh, North Carolina, served as the first female mayor of a U.S. state capital.[43]


The Scottish-born Alexander Winton built one of the first American automobiles in 1896, and specialized in motor racing. He broke the world speed record in 1900.[44] In 1903, he became the first man to drive across the United States.[44] David Dunbar Buick, another Scottish immigrant, founded Buick in 1903.[44] The Scottish-born William Blackie transformed the Caterpillar Tractor Company into a multinational corporation.[44]


Scottish Americans have made a major contribution to the US aircraft industry. Alexander Graham Bell, in partnership with Samuel Pierpont Langley, built the first machine capable of flight, the Bell-Langley airplane, in 1903.[45] Lockheed was started by two brothers, Allan and Malcolm Loughead, in 1926.[45] Douglas was founded by Donald Wills Douglas, Sr. in 1921; he launched the world's first commercial passenger plane, the DC-3, in 1935.[45] McDonnell Aircraft was founded by James Smith McDonnell, in 1939, and became famous for its military jets.[45] In 1967, McDonnell and Douglas merged and jointly developed jet aircraft, missiles and spacecraft.[45]


Scottish Americans were pioneers in human spaceflight. The Mercury and Gemini capsules were built by McDonnell.[45] The first American in space, Alan Shepard, the first American in orbit, John Glenn, and the first man to fly free in space, Bruce McCandless II, were Scottish Americans.[45]

The first men on the moon, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, were also of Scottish descent; Armstrong wore a kilt in a parade through his ancestral home of Langholm in the Scottish Borders in 1972.[45] Other Scottish American moonwalkers were the fourth, Alan Bean, the fifth, Alan Shepard, the seventh, David Scott (also the first to drive on the moon), and the eighth, James Irwin.[45]


Scottish Americans have also been leaders in computing and information technology. The Galashiels-born James Graham Johnston and Thomas J. Watson, of Scotch-Irish descent, developed an early tabulating machine in 1916 and founded IBM in 1917.[42][46]

Scottish Americans Howard Aiken and Grace Murray Hopper created the first automatic sequence computer in 1939.[42] Hopper was also the co-inventor of the computer language COBOL.[42]


Software giant Microsoft was co-founded in 1975 by Bill Gates, who owed his start in part to his mother, the Scottish American businesswoman Mary Maxwell Gates, who helped her son to get his first software contract with IBM.[42] Glasgow-born Microsoft employee Richard Tait helped to develop the Encarta encyclopedia and co-created the popular board game Cranium.[42]




Community Activities[edit]

Some of the following aspects of Scottish culture can still be found in some parts of the USA.

Tartan Day[edit]

Main article: Tartan Day
Tartan Day parade in New York City.

National Tartan Day, held each year on April 6 in the United States and Canada, celebrates the historical links between Scotland and North America and the contributions Scottish Americans and Canadians have made to US and Canadian democracy, industry and society. The date of April 6 was chosen as "the anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320—the inspirational document, according to U.S. Senate Resolution 155, 1999, upon which the American Declaration of Independence was modeled".[51] "Scottish Heritage Month" is also being promoted by community groups around the United States and Canada.[52]



NYC is not the only large city to celebrate Tartan Day, there is also large events that take place in Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, California, Chicago, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Québec, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Argentina, Australia, and New Zealand.

Highland Games[edit]

Massed bands at the 2005 Pacific Northwest Highland Games


Scottish Gaelic language in the United States[edit]


Number of Scottish Americans[edit]


In the 2000 census, 4.8 million Americans self-reported Scottish ancestry, 1.7% of the total US population. Another 4.3 million self-reported Scotch-Irish ancestry, for a total of 9.2 million Americans self-reporting some kind of Scottish descent. According to American Community Survey in 2008 data, Americans self-reporting Scottish ancestry made up an estimated 1.9% of the total U.S. population. Self-reported Scottish and Scotch-Irish ancestry represented 3.1% of the U.S. population in 2008.[7]


Americans of Scottish descent outnumber the population of Scotland, where 4,459,071 or 88.09% of people identified as ethnic Scottish in the 2001 Census.[54][55]

1790 U.S Ancestry
Based on Evaluated census figures[56]
2000 U.S Ancestry
Self-reported only, from the U.S census[56]
Ancestry group Number
(1790 estimate)
% of
Ancestry Number
(2000 count)
% of
English 1,900,000 47.5 German 42,885,162 15.2
African 750,000 19.0 African 36,419,434 12.9
Scotch-Irish 320,000 8.0 Irish 30,594,130 10.9
German 280,000 7.0 English 24,515,138 8.7
Irish 200,000 5.0 Mexican 20,640,711 7.3
Scottish 160,000 4.0 Italian 15,723,555 5.6
Welsh 120,000 3.0 French 10,846,018 3.9
Dutch 100,000 2.5 Hispanic 10,017,244 3.6
French 80,000 2.0 Polish 8,977,444 3.2
Native American 50,000 1.0 Scottish 4,890,581 1.7
Spanish 20,000 0.5 Dutch 4,542,494 1.6
Swedish or other 20,000 0.5 Norwegian 4,477,725 1.6
Total 3,929,326[57] 100 Scotch-Irish 4,319,232 1.5
British (Total) 2,500,000 62.5 British (Total)
36,564,465 12.9

2006 American Community Survey[edit]

Scottish Americans by state[edit]

The states with the most Scottish populations:[59]

'Scottish ancestry' is Dark red and brown colors and indicate higher density: (Maps of American ancestries)

The states with the top percentages of Scottish:

Presidents of Scottish or Scotch-Irish descent[edit]

At least twenty three presidents of the United States have some Scottish or Scotch-Irish ancestry, although the extent of this varies. For example, Ronald Reagan's great grandfather was a Scot and Woodrow Wilson’s maternal grandparents were both Scottish. To a lesser degree Bill Clinton, James K. Polk and Richard Nixon have less direct Scottish, Scotch-Irish ancestry.

James Monroe (Scottish & Welsh)
5th President 1817-25: His paternal 2nd great-grandfather, Andrew Monroe, emigrated to America from Ross-shire, Scotland in the mid-17th century.
Andrew Jackson (Scotch-Irish)
James Knox Polk (Scotch-Irish)
James Buchanan (Scotch-Irish)
15th President, 1857-61: Born in a log cabin (which has been relocated to his old school in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania), 'Old Buck' cherished his origins: "My Ulster blood is a priceless heritage". The Buchanans were originally from Deroran, near Omagh in County Tyrone where the ancestral home still stands.[61]
Andrew Johnson (Scotch-Irish & English)
Ulysses S. Grant (Scottish, Scotch-Irish & English)
Chester A. Arthur (Scotch-Irish & English)
Grover Cleveland (Scotch-Irish & English)
Benjamin Harrison (Scotch-Irish & English)
William McKinley (Scotch-Irish & English)
26th President, 1901-09: His maternal great-great-great grandmother, Jean Stobo, emigrated to America from Scotland with her parents in 1699.
William Howard Taft (Scotch-Irish & English)
27th President 1909-13[65][66]
Woodrow Wilson (Scottish & Scotch-Irish)
28th President, 1913-21: His Scottish maternal grandparents, Rev. Dr Thomas Woodrow and Marion Williamson, emigrated to America in the 1830s. Throughout his career he reflected on the influence of his ancestral values on his constant quest for knowledge and fulfillment.[61]
Warren G. Harding (Scotch-Irish & English)
29th President 1921-23[67]
Harry S. Truman (Scotch-Irish, English & German)
33rd President 1945-53[68][69]
Richard Nixon (Scotch-Irish, Irish, English & German)
Jimmy Carter (Scotch-Irish & English)
39th President 1977-1981 (County Antrim)[7]
Ronald Reagan (Irish, Scottish, Scotch-Irish & English)
40th President 1981-89: His great grandfather, John Wilson, emigrated to North America from Paisley in 1832.[70]
George H. W. Bush (Scottish, Irish, Scotch-Irish & English)
41st President 1989-93: His great-great-great grandmother, Catherine Walker (nee McLelland), was Scottish.
Bill Clinton (Scotch-Irish & English)
42nd President 1993-2001 (County Fermanagh)[61][71]
George W. Bush (Scottish, Scotch-Irish & English)
43rd President 2001-09: His great-great-great-great grandmother, Catherine Walker (nee McLelland), was Scottish.
Barack Obama (Kenyan & English, with others including Scottish)
44th President 2009-present[72]

Vice Presidents of Scottish or Scotch-Irish descent[edit]

John C. Calhoun (Scotch-Irish)
10th Vice President 1825-32: Staunch advocate of states rights
George M. Dallas (Scottish)
15th Vice President 1845-49: Former Secretary of War


Sam Houston (Scotch-Irish)
President of Texas 1836-38 and 1841-44 [73]
Jefferson Davis (Scotch-Irish)
President of Confederate States of America 1861-1865
Arthur Saint Clair (Scottish)
President under the Articles of Confederation 1788

Scottish placenames[edit]

Dunedin, Florida
Edinburgh, Scotland

Some Scottish placenames in USA include:

See also[edit]


  4. ^ a b "Scottish Parliament: European and External Relations Committee Agenda, 20th Meeting 2004 (Session 2), 30 November 2004, EU/S2/04/20/1". 2011-08-14. Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  7. ^ a b c d "U.S. Census Bureau, 2008". Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  8. ^ "We Asked...You Told Us". Bureau of the Census. 1990. Retrieved 2012-05-15. 
  13. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 8-9.
  14. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 10.
  16. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 11.
  17. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 12.
  18. ^ a b Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 19.
  20. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 18, 19.
  21. ^ a b Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 20.
  22. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 41.
  26. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 28-29.
  27. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 29-32.
  28. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 154.
  29. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 32-38.
  30. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 38-40.
  31. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 13, 23.
  34. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 19, 41.
  37. ^ Evans, Nicholas J., ‘The Emigration of Skilled Male Workers from Clydeside during the Interwar Period’, International Journal of Maritime History, Volume XVIII, Number 1 (2006), pp. 255-280.
  39. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, p. 53.
  40. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 60-61.
  41. ^ Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 53, 72.
  42. ^ a b c d e f g Fry, How the Scots Made America, pp. 219-220.
  46. ^ Donors Who Made the Difference, Seasons, (Binghamton, NY: United Methodist Homes, August 2011).
  47. ^ The California Taco Trail, NPR (April 26, 2012).
  50. ^ "The Burns Supper". Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  52. ^ National Scots, Scotch-Irish Heritage Month in the USA,
  54. ^ a b Mary C. Walters, Ethnic Options: Choosing Identities in America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 31-6.
  56. ^ a b The Source: Gen. Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  57. ^ "U.S 1790 Census" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  58. ^ "2006 American Community Survey". Retrieved 2012-08-25. 
  59. ^
  60. ^ "The Presidents, Andrew Jackson". American Retrieved 19 November 2009. 
  63. ^ "The Presidents, Benjamin Harrison". American Retrieved 19 November 2009. 
  64. ^ [1][dead link]
  66. ^ "The Presidents, William Taft". American Retrieved 19 November 2009. 
  67. ^ "Warren Gamaliel Harding". Retrieved 2008-04-16. 
  70. ^ "The Presidents, Ronald Reagan". American Retrieved 19 November 2009. 
  71. ^ "The Presidents". American Retrieved 19 November 2009. 
  72. ^ "Obama receives Scots invitations". BBC News. 2008-11-05. Retrieved 2000-02-21. 
  74. ^ About Our City - City of Dunedin Florida[dead link]

External links[edit]