Tributes / John o’ da Shop – tribute to a life of service for the folk of Vidlin
Content warning: the article contains details of suicide, which the family wanted to see published. If you feel you are affected by this or related issues, help is available such as Mind Your Head.
“John was the heart and core of the community;
and it’s impossible to imagine Vidlin without him and his shop.”
There continues to be a deep sense of shock and ongoing disbelief intensely felt by everyone in the community following the untimely death of John Herculson earlier in August.
Photo: Courtesy of the Herculson family
A stalwart of the community if there ever was one, John o’ da Shop was not just the Vidlin shopkeeper; he was the soul of the place, where all the strings in the village came together.
Vidlin will never be the same without him.
A man at the centre of community life, who loved a yarn, welcomed everyone and was always interested in your news, yet at heart he was very much a private and shy person who in the end found it difficult to confide when life became too hard for him to continue.
Born on 22 October 1957 to Willie and Annie Herculson, John never wanted anything else then to continue the family business of John I Herculson, General Merchants, which his grandfather had started in 1916.
He went to Lunnasting Primary School and then to Brae Junior High School before he started working at Tod’s wholesaler in Lerwick.
When his father Willie died very suddenly in 1991, it was John’s turn to take on the shop.
He always wanted to have a bigger building, and this ambition was realised in 1993 when the new self-service shop opened, offering local folk an almost legendary selection of stock, and often at prices lower than in town.
However, over the years John found it hard to accept that his shop could not compete with the big supermarkets, and he struggled to adapt to the changes necessary to keep the shop viable.
As his younger sister Jean recalled in the eulogy read out during his funeral: “John lived a life of service to the folk of Vidlin like his father and grandfather before him. John tried so hard to give Vidlin the best shop he could.
“John was a very kind shopkeeper but not a good businessman. Too often he was not adding the necessary level of profit to the goods he was selling and, on many occasions, not adding any profit at all.”
One of the highlights every year was the Simmer Dim rally, which turned the shop into a much-loved round the clock service station providing the 300+ bikers with everything from petrol to hot pies and shaving cream.
It was a disappointment to John when, after 2013, the rally had to relocate to another part of Shetland.
John and his shop however continued to be held in high regard with the bikers. In recent years John’s own field has become home to an annual mini-rally to at least continue a tradition that goes back to the mid-1980s.
In appreciation more than 50 local bikers came out to escort his hearse from Goudie’s to the Vidlin hall for the funeral service last week. John would have been delighted by that.
Well known within the community was the length of time one could spend in the shop yarning, and many people in the village will have been told off after nipping down to the shop for a pint of milk which took them an hour or more.
In retrospect, this was time well spent, where memories were made.
The shop was the proverbial village square, where the spirit of the community became tangible, and John played a key role in this.
And yet he was on his own and particularly over the last years life did not become any easier. He aspired to what most people took for granted, getting married and having a family. Sadly, it was not going to happen for him.
When Covid hit in 2020, he and ‘the lasses’ in the shop worked tirelessly to support the community and the community supported the shop. It was a time of strong community spirit, something that was again on display two years later when John stood on a nail and failed to see his GP about it.
His foot became badly infected to the point that he was in danger of losing part of his leg. As he was being cared for in hospital recovering from having his big toe amputated, the community rallied to support John and managed to keep the shop open.
Photo: Shetland News
But life didn’t get any easier. His foot was troubling him again as well as his diabetes and mounting debts were making life difficult. John was never good at chasing late payments, or payments at all; he was far too shy and gentle for this more robust side of running a business.
And so he seemed trapped in a downward spiral, unable to accept the help that so many people were offering while the business and his health were failing.
Believing that he had let everybody down, he tragically took his own life.
Whereas we can hope for someone to come forward and give the shop a future, in John we have lost a lovely, kind and generous man from the midst of our community, a loss that will be felt by many for a very long time.
Almost everybody at John’s funeral was in tears when Steven Robertson read Stewart Grains’ poem John o’ Da Shop, which Stewart kindly gave permission to publish here:
John o’ Da Shop
I mind John o’ da Shop since I wis a peerie boy,
Fae him you wid buy aa kinds o’ ice-creams, sweeties an toys.
I wid geen ta Da Leggens wi mam an dad,
An nip ower apo da push-bike whan I wis a lad.
Da aald peerie shop, hed aa sorts o’ fare,
Whan Willie, Annie, Jean an John wir aa dere.
A lok o da aerands sat back ower an in ahint da till,
You axed fur whit you wanted, an waited fur da bill.
Dan cam da new, muckle shop. Time ta expand,
Da need ta upgrade wis dere, ta meet da demand.
He patt his hert an sowl intae da new shop,
Special deals aften better as Tesco or da Co-op.
John hed aa sorts o’ things ta git you oot o’ a jam,
An wines, beers & spirits, if you fancied a dram.
John stockit far mair as fok wid ivver tink,
Dey wir paint an cement an plugs fur your sinks.
He hed buckets, brushes, hammers an nails,
Tatties, Voe pies, bread, neeps an kale,
Engine oils, coolant, spray cans an grease,
He even wrappit up his ain blocks o’ cheese.
His 99p greetings cairds selection really wis amazin,
Dey wir aa types o’ eens fur aa kinds o’ occasions.
Da Xmas Drink List wid hae a lok o’ chaep booze,
Fur a spree or a paerty, you really couldna lose.
You wid nip alang, needin somethin ta mak da tae,
John wid spaek. Ay somethin ta ax you or somethin ta say.
A’ll no lie, you might stand at da till yarnin fur a while,
John comin wi your change, in his ain particular style.
Openin da shop oot-o-hours wis nivver a budder,
Da selection idda shop really wis laek nae idder.
John wid nivver want ta see you stuck,
An he didna joost keep ony aald bruck.
If dey wir somethin in particular dat you might need,
He wid geen oot o’ his wye an do a good deed.
Aften he wid hae tasty goods on offer,
Dat wid aa help tae top up his coffers.
Mony a time we wid spaek aboot whisky,
A fine purchase fae John wis nivver risky.
He hed a roog o’ malts sittin up high,
Temptation wis ay dere, eyein een up tae buy.
He wis ay interested in whit you wir up tae,
Da news, da fok an da yarns wid mak his day.
He wid ax aboot your holidays, your wark, an DIY,
You wid be blyde ta tell him your news, dat kinda wye.
He enjoyed a good story, I firmly believe,
So you ay keepit a joke or a yarn up your sleeve.
You wid tell him sumthin an hae him gaffin,
Dan he widna be able ta spaek back fur laachin.
Whan da strange times o’ da lockdown cam aboot,
He göd da extra mile fur aabody, dir is nae doot.
If you couldna laeve da hoose ta fetch your gear,
He wid mak wi da van an deliver hit, nae faer.
John wis clivver, wise, witty an smart,
A yarn or discussion, he hed dat doon ta an art.
You could stand dere fur lang, haein a debate,
Winnin hame ta da hoose, you might aesy be late.
Whan da shop wis closed da office lights wid byde on,
Da paperwark, accounts & invoices still hed ta be don.
But whan dat wis by wi, you wid see John oot croftin,
Caain his sheep or fixin a fence dat needed sortin.
John served da village wi passion an grace,
Wirkin hard, wi aathing in hits place.
He did his very best ta provide wis wi goods,
An you wid ay laeve da shop in a braaly guid mood.
Vidlin il nivver be da sam ithoot dee dere,
Du wis an ever-present an really did care.
Wi dee aboot, an haein Da Shop, we aa felt blissed,
John – du really will be sorely missed.
- John Peter Herculson, shopkeeper, born 22 October 1957, died 11 August 2025.
John’s sister Jean is keen to explore any possibility for the shop to continue in Vidlin and would do anything in her powers to help someone willing to take it on.
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