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Streets of Blantyre
(And a little bit of History)

Calder Street runs from East to West. It starts halfway up Craig Street which is running North to South and ends at Stonefield Road which is also running North to South, it also bisects Victoria Street and Priory Street.

On the corner with Craig Street and the left hand side of Calder Street, traveling West, stands the Blantyre Miners Welfare Hall.This hall played a big part in the live's of all who lived in Blantyre. It had all types of social activity going on from Bowling, Boxing, Gymnastics, Billiards, and Dancing, it opened early and closed late for the miners. I suppose you could say that it was the main meeting place in all of Blantyre. There was always something taking part at all times of the day. One of the main attractions for the boys and men was the Billiard and Snooker room. I did, and a lot of other miners sons, spent a lot of hours in there learning to play snooker.

Friday was the big day of the week after the miners were paid. Anyone who fancied himself as a good player was in there looking for a game to win some money and at times a lot of money changed hands. The miners would gamble on anything, so if it was raining, they would be in the snooker room for a bit of action. Quite often you would get some out of town guy like AXE, who would come in from Hamilton and take on the best at that time in Blantyre. Of course this was all pre-arranged about a week ahead so all the miners who were interested in this would have learned about the match by word of mouth at their local mines. Although there was not supposed to be any gambling in the Welfare Hall it was very hard to control and a guy with thick rimmed glasses was usually employed as the attendant, I kid you not Margaret!

As you can imagine 2 0'Clock Friday the place always started to get filled up. Occasionally you would see a miner who slipped in still in his work clothes and a coal covered black face, afraid of missing the action, this was against the rules of the Welfare club and they were usually asked to leave, but the next week someone else would try it.

I think that if they had gone straight home the wife would have been demanding her part of the wages to run the household and pay off the bills (we called "this on the tick") and he might not have enough to drink and gamble with and with some, those were the priorities. Not all miners were like this but a good percentage of them were.

Think about it Margaret,You're a miner say 40 years old, you have worked down the pit's all your life, since you were ten and you live your life with the daily fear that something is going to happen to you one of these days while you are down the pit. Your father before you worked down the pit and they had nothing to give you for a little start in life, not even a guaranteed roof over your head, most homes were owned by the owners of the pits, so most times you started life with nothing but what you stood up in.

Like most human beings mother nature comes along and tells that it is time to find a wife and procreate and before you know it you have at least half a dozen kids to feed.You never have had a holiday and you can't afford to go anywhere, you owe money to the company store and if you have worked all these years down the pit, health wise you are not in very good shape, just from the dust alone that you have inhaled all those years. It's impossible for us in our modern society to try and imagine what they the miners and their families went through, so if he is a miner living in this type of environment and all these pressure associated with his daily existence in a SERFDOM. I believe it would be more than just hard to function like a man and being in such a frame of mind he would try to find some solace in drinking and gambling, which in the long run never really helped him, but it was all he had to ease that hurt of just existing and that we as modern people with all our education and all the great imaginative ideas that we can come up with are still in my mind a long way short of knowing what he our GG Grandfather WAS!.

Like I say it was not a life! If anything, it may have been close to an existence. To-day the inside of the welfare has been gutted out and it is more like a huge modern social club.

After the Welfare on the left hand side going West on Calder Street is The Calder Street Public School, this meets up with Victoria Street which is traveling North and South. Across Victoria Street on the corner is the Blantyre Health Institute.This institute was used during the war years like a town hall, everything from Gas Masks, Cod liver oil, Orange Juice, Ration Books, everything that was in short supply and was controlled by the Government was distributed from here to those who were in the category of essential need.

I can remember four things in my life associated to the health institute. The first would be back around 1937 when we as a miner's family were taken up to the health institute to be deloused. I think the reason behind this was coming from the raw's into a new council house they wanted to make sure we did not bring any unwanted little beasties with us. When we came out of there we were all covered in a purple paint. Most families in Blantyre went through this, so it was in no way considered degrading, that's just the way it was. I and my three brothers, well we could not care less but my older sister, she was a different story, mortified I believe was the word she used through her tears.

The second item was around about the same time and it is quite possible that they both went hand in hand. Our family and a lot of other families were all issued new clothes at the health institute. These cloths and footwear were all donations from the Toc-H. They consisted of a grey flannel jacket, shorts, a white silvery shirt and a pair of Clakity/Clickety Bit's.

For the first month in Blantyre there were all these kids going around all wearing the same type clothes, but they soon got torn and dirty and were soon flung aside. Again my older sister rebelled with the idea of wearing those ankle length tie up boots,which immediately singled you out as some one who had to be supported through donations. Nothing would make her wear those boots, she was a red-head and had the anger and spirit that seems to go with them.

The third item was the time when the whole town alphabetically had to go to the health institute for a Smallpox inoculation (or jab's). I can remember the stories that went about on how sore (painful) it was passed around the town by those that had had their inoculation first the A.B.C.D. It was a painful procedure for us kids but it was blown all out of proportion, so by the time your name came up you were already petrified of what was going to happen to you. There was a lot of squealing and crying before the Doctor or Nurse got anywhere near you, all you had to hear was your next and it was your turn to do your thing. I can remember I was pretty good at it. This was the inoculation that left you marked for life.

Two or three days after the jab's the whole injection site scabbed over for a couple of weeks and when the scab had formed into a crust it then dropped off and left you scarred for life. Also around about this same time in Blantyre we had Tuberculosis cases, Scarlet Fever, Diphtheria, Scabies, Chicken Pox, Mump's, Whooping Cough and Poliomyelitis and various other problems. We did not at this time have the National Health Service so any ailments were taken to your local doctor and as most miner's in Blantyre did not have the money to spend on a doctor, it was the norm most of the time, to live and survive with it.

There were not to many families in Blantyre that got away without any deaths in the family through all of these illnesses. Our family and a lot of the families that lived around us all suffered through the years 1926-1945.Those were hard times in Blantyre, more so if the head of the family was out of work up until 1939, as many a miner was.

The fourth item Margaret was to do with my own Father, although he had worked the pit's from when he was twelve until the beginning of the war 1939 he had managed to get himself from being a miner to being a member of the medical rescue team. He had gone to school to learn First Aid and had passed all his exams through the St Andrew"s Ambulance Association, putting him in a much cleaner job and environment and a better hourly salary. When war was declared he was immediately called into being a member of the National First Aid Post. Their job was to go to various parts of the country where a rescue team was needed. He spent a whole two weeks in the Clydebank blitz during which time we as a family never knew where he was until he came home. The First Aid Post was in the Blantyre Health Institute during the war and I used to visit my dad often on my way home from school.

The health institute still stands on the same spot, Corner of Calder Street and Victoria Street but has been enlarged to suit the increase of population. After the institute there was an open field which the farmer from Stonefield farm used for grazing his cows.This area is now a part of the Blantyre Nursery School and then followed by the Calderside Academy, both of which are new. Before they were built there was an open field and after them a coal contractors yard owned by Thomas Barclay & Son's. Netherfield Place. My dad also worked here from when he was a boy of ten until he went to the pits at twelve. He was carrying bags of coal on his back.

After Tom Barclay's came an other Council Housing Scheme which the Blantyre folks just called the Calder Street Council Houses, when making a reference to them.This Council Scheme was situated on a part of the property that once was known as DIXON'S RAW'S. The raw's consisted of seven Streets Starting with Calder Street, Dixon Street, Hall Street and Park Street all traveling East to West the other three streets were Mill Street, Govan Street and Carfin Street. These three traveled North to South.

This was a big Raw's and was the biggest in Blantyre The Calder Street Council houses still stand here although a lot of them have been bought from the South Lanarkshire County Council and made into private homes. The left hand side of Calder Street going North finishes here at the Junction of Stonefield Road. Going South from Stonefield Road are another row of Council Houses which runs down until it reaches a street coming in from the Glasgow Road (Main Street) running North to South, called Priory Street.This whole street is a part of the Calder Street Scheme and consists of all council homes. After Priory street traveling East we have a few more Council Homes after which we have a couple of small Grocery and Confectionery stores. Before they were built this was the entrance to the Stonefield Farm. After the stores we have a few bungalows which takes us up to the next street coming in from the Glasgow Road this road travels North to South.This road is called Victoria Street and travels all the way south to meet up with the High Blantyre Main Street.

On the corner of Calder Street and Victoria Street is the Blantyre Police Station,The police station runs along until it meets up with the Blantyre Public Library. The Blantyre Heritage Society has a fair size collection of memorabilia held in the Library and also have a fair amount of statistics of old Blantyre on computer. I found some information that I was looking for on my family and I most certainly recommend that any one researching Blantyre who is from out of town make this a must visit.

Next the ASDA parking lot starts here and runs over to meet up with what's left of Logan Street.

Margaret,
We are now more or less at the center of Blantvre when we reach Victoria Street.This street runs from the Glasgow Road (Main Street) all the way South to Catch up with the Main Street of High Blantyre.This street was at one time named Clay Street. It is the only street in Blantyre that runs in a straight line and bisects quite a few streets running East to West, starting with Calder Street in the North, then Small Crescent, Hardie Street, Welsh Drive, Nursery Place and finishing at Main Street High Blantyre.

On the left hand corner looking South stood Ness's School. On the other side of the street was the start of a tenement type building which continued up the Glasgow Road. On the corner of this tenement building was a grocery store. Further on up past the tenement building was the entrance to Hastie's Farm.

This was a farm as I knew it in the 1930's it had cows and a dairy with a lot of stable space which was used by the farmer and local carters for sheltering their horses, I can remember the large cobble stones through-out the yard and all of the slipping and sliding that went on on the frosty mornings when they were first brought out of the stables to be harnessed, they seemed to have a sense that told them that they had to tread much more carefully on a morning like this. Most of the horses were Clydesdale's

By the 1950's Hastie's farm started to go through a change where it was turned into a Restaurant and Banqueting Facilities. Over the years it became very well known in Lanarkshire.and drew a fairly large crowd most nights, it had to have been going for nearly 30 years before it was sold and in is place now stands a Retirement Home called Victoria Nursing Home.

Further up the street there was a Fruit, Vegetable, and Plant Nursery where a lot of the locals bought their tomatoes and seedlings for their allotments or small holdings.

Directly across from there was where I was born in 1930, the address was 3 Victoria Street a row of Miners Raw's which went under the name of the Honeymoon.

There was a wall to the North which surrounded the Ness's School from the squalor of the raw's. This wall came in handy for us to kick our ball up against and we used it for many other activities. Some of the Honeymoon kids attended the school so any playthings lost over the wall were usually returned to us. Like all the raw's in Blantyre ours being one of the oldest it was a mess

All of this from Ness's school and up past the Honeymoon has been demolished and in is place stands the ASDA Shopping Center.

Next to us was the Blantyre Police station where my dad threatened on many occasion to put us boys if we did not behave ourselves. When I was about the age of 10-12 my dad did at one time make that sort of an arrangement with the police sergeant where by I was taken into the police station and shown the holding cells and the sergeant told me that this was where I was going to put if I did not straighten up my ideas. Of course my dad was pretty friendly with this particular sergeant,It did not scare me any. I thought it was a good idea.

The police Station stands on the comer of Calder Street and Victoria Street. Across the street from the Police Station stands Calder Street School and across the street West is the Blantyre Public Health Center.

Past the Health Center is a Playing Field belonging to the Academy on Calder Street.This used to be an open field where the farmer from the Stonefield Farm allowed his cows to graze. This is now only used for the outside activities associated with the Academy.
On the other East side of the street there is now a bowling green belonging to the Blantyre miners welfare.

From here to the Main Street in High Blantyre all the rest of Victoria Street is taken up by a Council Scheme which I have only ever heard it referred to as Morris Street Council scheme. Margaret, this is the scheme that your Dad and cousins spent a few years. The scheme has gone through at least 3 types of renovations over the past 70 odd years, but they are still standing.

Victoria Street had a funny ending to it when it finished at the Main Street High Blantyre. It had narrowed down to a passage way not even wide enough for a cart to past through, only wide enough at its widest point to let 2 pedestrians shoulder to shoulder pass.

The following list was made up by my Cousin Robert Dunsmuir from Blantyre.

LIST of TENEMENT BUJLDINGS and SHOPS in BLANTYRE Starting from Burnbank / Blantyre boundary on left hand side of Glasgow Road
Springwell.

1. House, McDougald Fruit & Veg Merchant.

2.Lawsons Building. Shop, small grocer & baker, owned by Meg Lawson.

3. Chalmers Building, next to Caldwell hall (Coffin hall) Stonefield Church hall.

4 Rosendale, 3 storey red sandstone building (behind) church halls, Auchinraith Club at end of same building. Auchinraith Rd --- L/H side, James's Place, Radnor BLd, Melbourne PL, (Buggy). R/H Side, Bute Ter.

5.Henderson Bld, Glasgow Rd, vacant shop. Clarks Funeral, Solicitors office. On the corner was Kelly's Horse Shoe Bar.

7.Botterrils Building, Shop, fish restaurant & tearoom.

8. Burleigh Church. Herbertson St -- Roberts Building, Telephone exchange, old police sub station around 1900

9. Co-op halls, offices & shops, central branch stretching from halfway up Herbertson St, to Jackson St. Jackson St-- Building at top of street probably named Jackson Ter.,

10 Kidd's Building (Sproats Laun). Shops, I Vacant, Hughie Kidd's fish & chip, Smiddy Pub. Elm st -- Merry's Rows back to Auchinraith Rd.

11. Stonefield Parish Church Church St.

12.Masonic Buildings built in three stages 1. Small tenement & Dr Hutchinson's surgery 2. Masonic Temple & halls, Shops Bowie's Florist, fruit & veg, Aitkenhead Butcher, Mathieson jeweler, Bank, 3. Priory Bar & building called Priory Place, Logan St

I3.Turners Building Shop unknown

14.Central Building, Shops Co-op chemist, Ladies Hairdressers,& Dr Gordons Surgery. Craig St.

I5.Tenement building in Craig St. L/H Carlton Place

16. Harpers Garage.

17.Hill's Laun building, Shops Hill's Pawnbrokers, Haddows Dentist

18.Low Blantyre school (Ness's) Victoria St -- L/h the Honeymoon, Police Station.

19.Annfield Ter, Gibson's shop grocery & provisions,
Priory St

20. Stonefield Tavern could be the oldest house in Blantyre. (But it is not as The Barnhill Tavern dates back further, Bill)

21.Co~op N02 Branch two buildings

22.Knights o St Columbia Building McNally's chip shop on gable end (now Sun House Chinese Take~a-way.

23. Y.M.C.A.building

24. Olivers Building, Shops Lawyers office, Hairdressers. Plumbers, Hughes photographer

Stonefield Road Valerios Bld, Micky's Ice Cream Parlour, Scobies Bakers, Benham Newsagent, Chip shop, McCallum grocers, Painters, Gibson Grocery, Pub, Norris Grocery. Butchers

25.Craigs Building Craigs Pub

26. McNeils Building & Pub. Bardykes Rd & Boundary.

TENEMENTS starting R/H side of Glasgow Rd from Burnbank / Blantyre boundary. Springwell

27. Dougie Fraser's Building & shop. Amison Place.

28. Duncans BId Shops. Kane Butchers

29. Valerios Bld & Enzios lce Cream Parlour.

30. Robertson's Lemonade Works.

31. Mount Pleasant BLd & Cottages. Whistleberry Rd -- Craighead pit on L/H SIde, Whistlberry Colliery 1&2 on RlH side

32. Greyhound Stadium, & Celtic Football ground behind Bairds Rows.

33. Grants Bld, Shops Owens Cycle & acc,. Ella Little Grocery, Sub Post Office & Sam Douglas Hairdressers.
Lane to Baird's Rows (Craighead Rows)

34.Gilmours Bld, Shops Gilmours Grocery, Blacks Bakery, Gilmour Clothes etc., Angies Ice Cream Parlour, small Grocery, Richardson's Butcher.
Forrest St -- Cinema Flea Pit, Blantyre Victoria Football ground, Oilworks. Salvation Army Citadel.

35.Various Bld, Shops Livingstonian Pub, 1st Masonic Temple. Jope's Surgery, Chemist, Tempelton Grocery,
Clarkston Newsagent,Wee Don's (Valerio) Ice Cream, Marshalls shoe shop. Butchers, Wellington Pub.
Clark St.-- Building next to Vic's Park, Blind Watties Briquettes & Parraffin Merchants

36. Various BId, Shops, Mathew Millar cobblers, Hairdressers (Thorburn), Agnew's Fish, Lightbody Cakes, British Restaurant later Gas Board showroom, Batters ironmongers, Boyd's Hall, (Bookies), Sandy Thompson Newsagent, Callaghan Dress & clothes, Sweet shop where Pasha Cigs were sold.
John St -- Slaughterhouse, Kelly's Engineering, McPhee's Piggery, Lane to Station.

37. McAlpines Buildings, Shops McLaughlin's Pub, Davidson Draper, Hairdressers, Newsagents (Sandy
Thompson), Allans Fish & Chips, (name changed to Andrews), Hughes Grocery, Mc Alpine St.

38. Brown's Bld, Shops Fruiters (Cathy Potts), Norris grocer's, Picture House (The Dookit), Paterson's
Chemist & Optician, Hogg's Newsagent (later Pates), Littles the Baker, Paterson (Painter & Decorator),
Peter Craig Butchers. Greenside St.

39. Harts BLd Shops Cosy Corner Pub, Peter Valerio Ice cream Parlour, Jimmy Cleary's Ladies & Gents
hairdressers, Central Bar PlH, Browns Painter & Decorator, Peter Craig Butchers, Adam's Fumiture Store, Blantyre Gazette Clifford Printers. Entrance to Stonefleld public Park.

40. Vincent's BLd, Shops Bakers, Norries Fish, Mauchline Newsagent, Vincents Fish Restuarant, McWilliams Grocery.

Station Rd -- Nicholsons BLd & Shop, Railway station, Village, Livingstone Memorial.

41. Broadway Cinema, Two storey Bld, Shops Birrel confectionary, Templetons, Dentist, Calaghan Drapery.

42. Bethany Hall.(Methodist Church). Joanna Ter -- Entrance to St Joseph School.

43. Building Joanna Ter, Shop Chemist.

44.Old Chapel House (was first RC Chapel & School 1878 )

45. St Joseph Church. Mayberry Pl-- New Chapel house

46. Mayberry BId.

47.Livingstone Memorial Church.

48.Small two storey building. Thornhill Place.

49.Parkville Hotel.

50.Residential Cottages.

51. Council Houses. (Coatshill) Whins Rd West End. -- Priory Pit, Blantyreferme Pit, Tenement Building at Fin-me-oot.(Uddingston)Boundary

Source Unknown - Bill would like to know who the Author was in order to give him credit for this valuable piece of Blantyres History

 

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