Twelve young men in black and white vertical stripes look towards the camera – shinty sticks in hand. Their baggy shorts and collared shirts hint at the 1950s era, and the trophy at their feet shows they have good reason to be grinning – but only a shinty stalwart would be able to tell you that the photo shows Dalmally team Glenorchy, celebrating winning their first big trophy, the Munro shield.

The picture is one of a series posted on the Shinty Memories Facebook and Twitter feeds. Featuring action shots, team photos, and shinty grounds and characters from across the Highlands, this social media activity is one aspect of a project which has a dual purpose – to gather content for a national archive, and to create shinty-inspired resources to help people living with dementia and loneliness.

John Mackenzie, a celebrated Newtonmore player and former president of the Camanachd Association, is the Shinty Memories Ambassador. “I’ve made a great many friends through shinty, and I’m enjoying trying to put a little back into something I’ve enjoyed all my life,” he says.

“I want to encourage folk in the shinty community to form groups to allow those affected by dementia the enjoyment of spending time with friends, sharing memories and and looking at pictorial evidence of the past.”

John gained a particular insight into the impact of dementia through his friendship with another ex-Newtonmore player and Camanachd Association President, Douglas ‘Dougie Dhai’ MacKintosh, who died last year.

Douglas lived with dementia towards the end of his life, and a 2016 BBC Alba documentary showed the pair sharing stories and laughing at old photographs. Dougie would become more engaged whenever talking about shinty, and an interview with his wife Anne, confirmed how important such interactions became for him.

Around 93,000 people in Scotland are living with dementia, including 2,000 in Argyll and Bute.

The brain illness makes it harder to remember, and has an impact on thinking, feeling and behaviour. Those affected can find it hard to socialise – something that Sports Heritage reminiscence groups across Scotland seek to mitigate.

Shinty Memories is part of a national Sports Heritage project which also sees football, rugby, cricket, golf and curling organisations share resources and work together, with Alzheimer Scotland, to build community networks. Of these, the football network is the most established, with groups active across the country.

“We try to keep mixed groups, and welcome anyone who would benefit, because although dementia is a core area, the aim is social interaction,” explains Richard MacBrearty, Football Memories project director and curator of the Scottish Football Museum, who facilitates several reminiscence groups around Glasgow.

“We might start with a video, then we look at cards with pictures of football legends from the past. We sit down and we laugh and we tell stories,” he says. “Some people will just want to listen, but by the end of the session everyone’s talking and everyone’s got a story to tell.

“If you’re struggling to remember last week or last year, that’s a difficult place to be. When you bring someone to a period of time they can remember, by having a conversation about how you got to a game, for example, that empowers them – it gives a person their memories back, and their confidence too.”

Sports historian Hugh Dan MacLennan is one of the project’s organisers, collating and archiving a wealth of material from across the six sports. Though 5,000 images have already been processed, he is keen to hear from anyone who can loan or donate good quality pictures, match programmes and other memorabilia.

“We use the images to create cards, which can be laminated and put on the tables to stimulate conversation,” he explains. “if someone has, or inherits old images which they don’t know what to do with, we can take them, digitise them, and either return them or pass them on to an archive.”

“Our focus at the moment is on the 1940 to 1990 bracket, as that’s the generation that is now living with dementia most often (though it is hitting younger people too). People born in that window are suffering or beginning to suffer, and it’s a frightening thing.”

The project is at a critical stage, with funding and volunteers needed if it is to progress. Organisers hope to recruit volunteers and initiate groups in the Argyll and Lochaber areas, benefiting from the rich heritage shared by teams that include Oban Camanachd, Oban Celtic, Ballachulish, Inveraray, Glenorchy, Taynuilt and Kilmory.

Michael White, from Alzheimer’s Scotland, is a founder of the Memories projects, and believes that the shinty community has something distinctive to offer. “This project seeks to evoke memories and draw out stories, and shinty does that in spades, because the stories are connected with people, with teams, with the villages, and with the journeys to and from,” he says. “Everyone has a box of memories, and it’s our job to find the key that opens it.”

Get involved

• Follow Shinty Memories, plus football, rugby and other reminiscence groups on Facebook and Twitter.

• Loan or donate your old shinty photos and memorabilia to the project.

• Volunteer your time to establish or support a local memories group.

Go to www.sportsheritagescotland.co.uk or email info@sportsheritagescotland.co.uk for information.