James Leslie Dow was a Church of Scotland

Church of Scotland

The Church of Scotland, known informally by its Scots language name, the Kirk, is a Presbyterian church, decisively shaped by the Scottish Reformation....

 minister

Minister of religion

In Christian churches, a minister is someone who is authorized by a church or religious organization to perform functions such as teaching of beliefs; leading services such as weddings, baptisms or funerals; or otherwise providing spiritual guidance to the community...

, broadcaster

Presenter

A presenter, or host , is a person or organization responsible for running an event. A museum or university, for example, may be the presenter or host of an exhibit. Likewise, a master of ceremonies is a person that hosts or presents a show...

 and author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

.

Born at Paisley

Paisley

Paisley is the largest town in the historic county of Renfrewshire in the west central Lowlands of Scotland and serves as the administrative centre for the Renfrewshire council area...

 and educated at Glasgow University (Trinity College

Trinity College, Glasgow

Trinity College, Glasgow, Scotland, is the Church of Scotland's College at the University of Glasgow. It provides special supervision of candidates for the ministry through a Principal and a College Council...

), Dow was ordained in 1932 and spent several years as a chaplain in Assam

Assam

Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...

, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 before becoming minister of Cartsburn Augustine church in Greenock

Greenock

Greenock is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council area in United Kingdom, and a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland...

 in 1943. In 1965 he became minister at Lochranza

Lochranza

Lochranza is a village located on the Isle of Arran in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland. The population, somewhat in decline, is around 200 people....

 on the Isle of Arran

Isle of Arran

Arran or the Isle of Arran is the largest island in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland, and with an area of is the seventh largest Scottish island. It is in the unitary council area of North Ayrshire and the 2001 census had a resident population of 5,058...

, a post he held until his death in 1977.

Dow frequently contributed to the local newspaper, the Greenock Telegraph

Greenock Telegraph

The Greenock Telegraph is a local daily newspaper serving Inverclyde, Scotland.Founded in 1857, it was the first halfpenny daily newspaper in Britain. It was for a time Greenock Telegraph and Clyde Shipping Gazette, owing to the massive amount of maritime traffic moving in and out of Greenock's...

, and was a contributor to religious programmes on the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 including Songs of Praise

Songs of Praise

Songs of Praise is a BBC Television programme based around traditional Christian hymns. It is a widely watched and long-running religious television programme, one of the few peak-time free-to-air religious programmes in Europe Songs of Praise is a BBC Television programme based around traditional...

and on Scottish Television

Scottish Television

Scottish Television is Scotland's largest ITV franchisee, and has held the ITV franchise for Central Scotland since 31 August 1957. It is the second oldest ITV franchisee still active...

 (Late Call). In 1973 he wrote a fictionalised account of an encounter between James Graham, Marquess of Montrose and one John Pitcairn, Laird of Cleish in 1649, immediately before Graham's execution by the Covenanters. Dow published his autobiography in 1975, the same year he completed a history of Greenock.

Dow was also a playwright, his 1962 play Tail-piece winning a national amateur dramatics competition. He was an occasional actor, which led one critic to comment that it was the first time he had heard Falstaff

Falstaff

Sir John Falstaff is a fictional character who appears in three plays by William Shakespeare. In the two Henry IV plays, he is a companion to Prince Hal, the future King Henry V. A fat, vain, boastful, and cowardly knight, Falstaff leads the apparently wayward Prince Hal into trouble, and is...

 portrayed with a Scots accent.

He also wrote a Dictionary of the Bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

in 1964 which has remained in print ever since. Dow's son published a collection of his father's writings in 2001.

Publications

• A Dictionary of the Bible (1964), Collins.
• American Wit and Wisdom (1971), Collins.
• Late and Early (collection of sermons) (1972), St. Andrew Press
• Graham Came by Cleish (novel) (1973), Jarrolds.
• No Better Than I Should Be (autobiography) (1975), Hutchinson
• Greenock (1975), Greenock Corporation
• Words of My Father: A Selection of Talks Broadcast by the Late Rev. James L. Dow (ed. Tom Dow) (2001), Whitewisp Press