Glasgow

by Alan Taylor

  There is a poster that hangs in the People’s Palace museum on Glasgow Green that sums up the city’s attitude to its comedians:

  ‘When Connolly was at the peak of his fame, a survey revealed that 74 per cent of the population of Glasgow thought that they could be funnier than Billy Connolly given the chance, while 17 per cent thought they were already funnier than Billy Connolly. The other 9 per cent thought that they were Billy Connolly.’

  THE BIGGEST HOUSING SCHEME IN EUROPE, 1975

  Cathy McCormack

  It was Billy Connolly who described estates like Easterhouse as ‘deserts wi’ windaes’, which was just about right. Except that in deserts it is hot and dry whereas in a place like Easterhouse it was more often cold and damp. The Easterhouse project got under way in 1954. One of Glasgow’s four great post-war schemes, it was over-exposed to the elements and lacked basic amenities. Soon it became a byword for deprivation and unsocial behaviour, despite the sterling efforts of residents such as Cathy McCormack.

  Greater Easterhouse is made up of fifteen areas and in January 1975, we moved from Cranhill to our own flat in Easthall. It was then the biggest housing scheme in Europe. Just a few years before, in the 1960s, the singer Frankie Vaughan had donated the takings of his show at the Pavilion Theatre in Glasgow to the Easterhouse Project. This was aimed at stopping gang warfare and he helped co-ordinate an arms amnesty. Unfortunately the media circus which followed him gave Easterhouse a bad reputation that still lives with us to this day. People were also further disadvantaged by reputation when it came to job applications. Even so, you had to have a reference to get a house up here and a lady called Helen Ewing recommended we get this house.

  What we moved to was basically a concrete bunker. It had a gas fire in the living room and an electric fire on the wall of one bedroom, but no heating in the other rooms or in the hall. There was nothing to keep the heat in or the cold out. But at the start we were delighted to get our own space and there was a garden and we were close to my sister, who lived round the corner. They called me Paintbrush Annie because I was always cleaning and decorating.

  The first shock I got was when I stripped the wallpaper off the bedroom and the pattern was on the wall. I couldn’t believe it. That was the first indication we got of how damp the house was. It was cold when we moved in and soon after, the mould started. I was continually washing the walls with bleach.

  There was a pulley in the kitchen and Sharon [her daughter] had the real McCoy nappies. But if you were boiling nappies you were creating steam and there were no fans to draw out the moisture. In Cranhill at my ma and da’s house the living room and the kitchen were back to back with a coal fire. Then came the Clean Air Act. It was passed in 1956 and in the 1960s, Glasgow Corporation ripped out all the coal fires. It certainly stopped the smog – my ma started to see dampness in her bathroom. But my end bathroom was the worst affected and a mustard carpet turned green. Taking away the coal fires started the real dampness epidemic. In their efforts to clean the air outside they polluted the air inside with fungal spores. And in the un-insulated concrete box that I lived in when Sharon was a baby, we were all struggling to fight the dampness and pay sky-high fuel bills.

  In our house in Easthall, the toilet was badly affected with mould and so were the wooden window frames. When it was really cold outside we had icicles hanging from inside our bedroom windows. In the summer it wasn’t so bad because I had a garden and a verandah but in winter it was a nightmare. ‘Oh my God it’s coming up Christmas again – look at the state of that room.’ I always had a paintbrush in my hand because it was never-ending. I was always complaining to the local housing office about the dampness. That was an amazing experience. You’d fill in a form to complain about the dampness. Usually nothing happened. So you’d go back and complain again. You’d complain and complain until you did get a response. And then somebody from the local housing office would come to investigate the condensation and dampness. They’d say: ‘You boil too many kettles. How many baths do you have a week? Oh – I see you have washing up on a pulley . . .’ At the end they started talking about me not having enough insulation on my letterbox – that’s when I thought we should draw a line under it.

  THE ONLY SANE MAN IN GLASGOW, 1975

  Matt McGinn

  Singer and songwriter Matt McGinn (1928–77) was born in the Gallowgate in the Calton, the eighth of nine children. His formal education ended when he was sent to an approved school at the age of 12. Latterly, however, he attended Ruskin College, Oxford, and taught for a while but he preferred the more nomadic life of a performer. He wrote hundreds of songs, including ‘Red Yo-Yo’, ‘Coorie Doon’, ‘The Ibrox Disaster’ and ‘The Wee Kirkcudbright Centipede’. Politically active and vocal, he was forever having scrapes with the authorities, some of which were decidedly surreal, as he described in McGinn of the Calton.

  On the third of October nineteen seventy-five the newspapers were full of it.

  ‘Roll up, roll up for the Great Sheriff Court Show, starring at great expense Comedian,’ ran The Scotsman.

  ‘How the Sheriff learned about the Bees,’ headlined the Daily Record. The Daily Express, which also did a very humorous piece on the Sheriff Court Show, printed a small poster with my face on it, declaring ‘Wanted, for Flybillposting’.

  The Scottish press and a large part of the English plus Radios Clyde and Forth, Scottish Television and even the pussyfooting BBC Television rose to the occasion and treated the Great Sheriff Court Show as the comic opera farce by which term I described it in Court.

  Charged with having displayed posters on sites throughout the city without the permission of the owners of the said sites, I was found not guilty of putting up the posters but guilty of refusing to get them down, and fined thirty pounds.

  The posters, fifty-one of which were mentioned, had appeared on walls and hoardings one night almost a year before, advertising two Long Playing records and reading in part ‘Matt McGinn’s Fantastic New LP, “The Two-Heided Man Strikes Again”. (The Big ’Shike) the follow-up to “The Two-Heided Man”, (The Big Effen Bee) on sale at Woolworths, Boots and other record shops.’

  Now Glasgow was full of such illegal poster advertisements informing the world that certain wares were available to people, such as Datsun cars at so-and-so garage, demonstrations to be held for and against abortion and telling of meetings where one could hear Harry McShane talking about unemployment or Yoko Hami on Karate or Paul Foot on how easy it would be to have a revolution next Tuesday at half-past-two provided it weren’t raining. There were literally thousands of them with as many names on them. But these ones with my name on them seemed to be special for some people, and on the basis of them some persons in Glasgow City Chambers decided to pounce.

  For those Chambers I have never had a great deal of respect. That well-known character The Clincher, had more respect for them than I. He was a hairdresser from the Maryhill district of the city whom certain officials connected with those chambers had at one time tried to have declared insane.

  The doctor at Hawkhead asylum to which he had been referred by one of the magistrates for examination stated that The Clincher was as sane as he himself was, to which The Clincher had retorted, ‘Could you give me a written statement to that effect?’

  From then on The Clincher, whom I remember seeing standing in the Trongate roaring and bawling about ‘The municipal Chamber and those who sit in it’, developed the habit of holding up his doctor’s letter and shouting, ‘I am the only sane man in Glasgow with a certificate to prove it.’

  In attacking the people connected with George Square he was expressing the disrespect which most Glaswegians have for these bureaucrats, if we are to judge by the fact that a thirty per cent poll at a municipal election is considered massive, but such attacks merited in their eyes special treatment for The Clincher, and like The Clincher I was to be singled out for extraordinary action.

  The other posters might be objectionable but the ones with McGinn�
�s name on them were outright obnoxious.

  The telephone rang in my Rutherglen home.

  ‘I would like to speak to Mister Matt McGinn,’ a voice said.

  ‘Speaking,’ says I.

  ‘This is a Mister Cumming of Glasgow Corporation Planning Department,’ said the voice, shocking me with the news that Glasgow had a Planning Department. Until then I had thought that those bloody great concrete jungles and deserts like The Calton and Dalmarnock and Partick had arisen by accident.

  ‘What’s your first name?’ says I.

  ‘I don’t think we’ll be on first-name terms,’ says the voice.

  ‘What’s your first name?’ I insisted, finally eliciting the information that it was Andrew.

  ‘Hello Andy,’ says I, still thinking I was being phoned regarding an engagement.

  ‘A number of posters have appeared throughout the city,’ said the voice, ‘advertising records of yours and I am phoning to warn you that if they are not taken down in the next seven days you will be prosecuted under the terms of the Town and Country Planning Act.’

  ‘I never put them up,’ says I.

  ‘Your name is on them,’ said the voice.

  ‘I’ve never seen them,’ says I, ‘but I never put them up.’

  ‘Who did put them up?’ asked the voice.

  ‘I don’t know,’ says I, ‘but I’ve an idea who might have done and I’ll pass on your message to them.’

  Some days later an official letter arrived from Cumming or Cummings indicating that he had done some considerable homework on these posters and that he or someone else had been spending a great deal of the ratepayer’s money in touring the city looking for posters with my name on them, singling them out from a million others and threatening prosecution if I did not have them removed.

  From previous experience in political campaigns I knew that pasting posters illegally is a tricky business and the business of taking them down proved every bit as tricky or even more so. Apart from the business of not being caught by the police there is the technical thing which makes taking a poster from a wall or boarding a great deal more difficult than pasting it up.

  However, I did not wish to have a clash with the law and after midnight that night, equipped with a paint scraper, I headed for Waterloo Street where I had seen a number of these posters on the front of a disused shop. In my own opinion the posters actually enhanced the appearance of the broken-down building but they were nonetheless illegal. There was even an inscription on the shop front saying ‘Bill stickers will be prosecuted’, under which someone had written, ‘Bill Stickers is Not Guilty’.

  So was I not guilty, but desirous of steering clear of the courts I set to with the scraper. I had not managed to remove four square inches of the first poster when a policeman’s torch shone on me.

  ‘What have we here?’ said the Bobby.

  ‘I’m trying to take down this poster,’ says I.

  ‘Have you the permission of the owner of these premises?’ says the Bobby.

  ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ says I. ‘But I have been instructed to get them down by Glasgow Corporation.’

  ‘Get on your way,’ says he, ‘or I’ll arrest you for defacing that wall or even worse.’

  1976–2000

  DESERTS WI’ WINDAES

  AN INDIAN SUNDAY, 1977

  Hardeep Singh Kohli

  Migrants from the Indian sub-continent have been coming to Scotland for centuries and gradually became part of the local community. In the nineteenth century, for example, Indian students came in increasing numbers. However, it was not until the 1920s that many arrived with the intention of staying permanently. In his book, The New Scots: The Story of Asians in Scotland (1992), Bashir Maan suggests that these early settlers originated in the Punjab. Not the least of their contribution has been cultural, with curry competing with fish and chips to supplant haggis, neeps and tatties as the national dish. Hardeep Singh Kohli (1969–) was born in London. He moved to Glasgow with his parents, who had come to Britain from India in the 1960s, when he was four. A graduate in law from Glasgow University, he is best known as a broadcaster, and for his love of food.

  Sunday was our day to be Indian. After a week of mundane Scottish life, my mother would wrangle her three sons into smart clothes and assault us with a facecloth before tramping us off with our dad to experience the delights of gurdwara, the Sikh temple. I never understood why we had to be smartly dressed to visit the temple. If God (who was the omnipotent and omniscient and all other words beginning with omni-) judged who we were rather than how we appeared, then why did we need to ensure that our trousers were freshly pressed and our shirts free of ketchup? This philosophical musing of an eight-year-old was often met with the counter-argument of a skelp across the back of the thighs.

  Temple was great. The religious component of praying and being holy was simply one of a myriad of activities that took place in what was no more than a rundown, near-derelict house on Nithsdale Drive in the Southside of Glasgow. As kids we mostly ran around at breakneck speed in our ironed trousers and ketchup-free shirts, trying our best to crumple our trousers and mark our shirts with ketchup. Gurdwara was where the entire community gathered; it was our parents’ single chance to re-engage with Sikhism and Sikh people. It must have been a blessed relief for them to feel relaxed amongst their ‘ain folk’, for at least one day of the week. When I think about the hard time I used to get as a small brown boy in Glasgow, I forget that my parents had to deal with yet more abuse in a more sinister, less forgiving world.

  There were two good things about the gurdwara, apart from the fact that about a hundred kids were at liberty to play and laugh and generally have a great time. At the end of the religious service, after the hordes had prayed collectively, the holy men would wander amongst the congregation who were sat cross-legged in the floor, handing out prasad. Prasad is a truly amazing thing. If you ever needed convincing that the universe has some higher power at its helm, then prasad would be the single substance to convert you. It’s a semolina- and sugar-based concoction bound together with ghee. It is bereft of nutritional value, but it is hot and sweet and lovely. And it’s holy. What more could you want?

  After prasad the congregation would filter downstairs to enjoy langar. I believe the Sikh religion to be the grooviest, most forward-thinking of all the world religions. Obviously, I have a vested interest, but given the fact that as an organised belief system Sikhism is little over 300 years old, one begins to understand the antecedents of its grooviness. It is a young, vibrant religion that is not bogged down with ancient scripture and dogma. Sikhs were able to experience the other great religions of the subcontinent and construct a new belief system that accentuated the positives whilst attempting to eradicate the negatives. And no more is this innovation exemplified than with the beautifully egalitarian concept of langar. Every temple is compelled to offer any comer a free hot meal. In India this happens on a daily basis, but when I was growing up in Glasgow, Sunday was the day of the largest communion. You can be the wealthiest man in Punjab or the lowliest cowherd, but together you sit and share the same modest yet delicious meal, cooked in the temple by devotees. This is langar.

  Our bellies full, we would drive a few miles from the temple into the centre of Glasgow, to the Odeon on Renfield Street. In the seventies and early eighties, cinemas were closed on Sundays, a fact utilised by the Indian community the length and breadth of Britain. For six days of the week, cinemas were bastions of British and American film, but on Sunday the sweeping strings and sensuous sari blouses of Bollywood took over. And it felt like every brown person in Glasgow was there. From three o’clock in the afternoon we had a double bill of beautiful women dancing for handsome moustachioed men; of gun fights and fist fights; of love and betrayal. These films were in Hindi, a language lost on us boys; we barely spoke any Punjabi. But the images were bold and strong and most importantly Indian. And guess what? There was also food involved. Hot mince and pea samosas were handed
round and occasionally the cinema would fill with the sound of old men blowing cooling air into their hot triangular snacks. Pakoras would be illicitly eaten with spicy chutney. There would be the inevitable spillage and some fruity Punjabi cursing, involving an adult blaming the nearest innocent kid for their own inability to pour cardamom tea from a thermos whilst balancing an onion bhaji on their knee. It was only some years later that I discovered that eating food in the cinema was banned.

  ‘THE BARGAIN’, 1977

  Liz Lochhead

  The Barrows or, as it is more commonly known, The Barras, is a legendary Glasgow institution. Its origins can be traced to the 1920s, when there was a market in Clyde Street on which cheap goods were displayed on handbarrows. When this was closed in the 1920s, Mrs Margaret McIvor and her husband, who had hired barrows to traders, bought land in the Calton and invited their former clients to set up shop. It expanded rapidly, selling mainly second-hand clothes. In the 1970s and 1980s, The Barras fell into disrepair and disrepute, but with the formation of the Barrows Enterprise Trust it enjoyed a revival, becoming one of Europe’s largest street markets. Liz Lochhead (1947–), poet and playwright, is a national treasure who from 2011–16 was Scots Makar, Scotland’s national poet.

  The river in January is fast and high.

  You and I

  are off to the Barrows.

  Gathering police-horses twitch and fret

  at the Tron end of London Road and Gallowgate.

  The early kick-off we forgot

  has us, three-thirty, rubbing the wrong way

  against all the ugly losers

  getting ready to let fly

  where the two rivers meet.

  January, and we’re

  looking back, looking forward