Big Jim MacLellan

James "Big Jim" MacLellan was a Cape Breton coal miner, mine manager and performer best known as the last surviving founding member of The Men of the Deeps, Canada's famous choir of working and retired coal miners. <cite index="1-1,1-2">MacLellan, from Glace Bay, N.S., was a coal-miner-turned-mine manager best known for his six-decade involvement with The Men of the Deeps, the famed men's chorus made up of miners.</cite> He died on Friday, October 30, 2026, in Nova Scotia at the age of 92.

MacLellan was from Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, a town built around the coal industry on Cape Breton Island. <cite index="1-3,1-4,1-5">On his first day of working in a coal mine, 17-year-old James (Big Jim) MacLellan faced an obstacle, and given his six-foot-five-inch frame, his supervisor observed that the first thing they had to figure out was how to get him in there.</cite> He went on to spend a career in the coal industry, eventually rising from miner to mine manager.

It was on stage, not underground, that he became widely known. <cite index="1-8">While MacLellan joined the group in 1966, he took about a decade off in the mid-1970s to mid-1980s because of his work as a mine manager.</cite> <cite index="1-6">MacLellan's height made him stand out on stage, but it was the monologues he delivered talking about the lives of coal miners and their communities that people remembered.</cite> <cite index="1-7">His son Jim MacLellan said, "He loved it. He loved the camaraderie, spending time with the guys and interacting with the audience, it meant a lot to him."</cite>

The Men of the Deeps toured widely during MacLellan's time with the group, taking him across Canada and into parts of the United States and giving audiences far from Cape Breton a glimpse of the island's industrial and musical heritage. MacLellan formally retired from the choir in 2025 after close to sixty years of performing, but he kept returning to the stage, continuing to perform with the group as recently as September 2026.

MacLellan's death was confirmed in news reports describing him as the choir's last founding member still living, a milestone that gave his passing particular weight within the Men of the Deeps community. <cite index="1-9">When MacLellan died on Friday, The Men of the Deeps was playing a show.</cite> A fellow Men of the Deeps supporter, Donnie MacDonald, wrote that MacLellan had been <cite index="3-1">"the last surviving founding member of The Men of the Deeps," who "retired in 2025 after performing for nearly 60 years"</cite> and had helped share Cape Breton's coal mining history both at home and abroad. A cause of death has not been made public.