Category: Biography (page 1 of 14)

John B Fenwick – Strathbungo Garage

First article in a series about Strathbungo’s motor garages.

Around 1915 John Booth Fenwick (1890-1958) first rented the backcourt at 724 Pollokshaws Road; a former bakery owned by the Gardner family and accessed through a pend from Pollokshaws Road. (The pend has long been blocked off and is now Otherside Records.) He set himself up as a motor car and cycle agent under the name of Strathbungo Garage. He shared the premises with a pawn shop and loan company, also owned by the Gardners.

This 1893 OS Map predates John Fenwick by 20 years. It shows the complexity of buildings in the backcourts of the Pollokshaws Road tenements, and the narrow Nithsdale Street entrance, later widened. The red outline marks the subsequent footprint of Fenwick’s. PHs = Allison Arms & Heraghty’s. Source: NLS Maps

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Nithsdale Street, by Duncan Brown

Duncan Brown (1819-1897) was a talented amateur photographer who documented Glasgow life from the 1850s onwards. This undated photograph from the Glasgow School of Art Archives features on TheGlasgowStory, and depicts Nithsdale Street from Allison Street, across Pollokshaws Road . For orientation, Heraghty’s pub & CC Barbers would be just to the left out of shot, and Strathbungo Station/Susie’s shop (alas no more) are in the far distance.

The photo has appeared here before, but it suddenly made more sense when rummaging in the valuation rolls for Nithsdale Street. Here’s a closer look.

2 Nithsdale Street

Enlargement

2 Nithsdale Street

The house on the right carries a sign for Robert Bryce, Plumber & Gasfitter. It was variously numbered 2 Nithsdale Street, or 694 Pollokshaws Road, and abutted the tenement that now houses Glasgow Photo Express and Koelschip Yard. It was Robert’s workshop from 1893 to 1900, which helps date the photograph.

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A Plane Crash in East Pollokshields

Only on the margins of Strathbungo, but having grown up on the margins of an aircraft factory, I love a bit of aviation trivia. This is the story of the crash, the pilot, the flying school, his plane, and a meander into the beginnings of unpowered flight.

Thrilling Crash

On this day, 25 May, almost 100 years ago, East Pollokshields was witness to a “thrilling” plane crash .

Newspaper article: Another Plane Crash. Thrill over Glasgow. Machine hits railway signal. Hundreds of workers in the Pollokshields district of Glasgow witnessed a thrilling aeroplane smash, which fortunately resulted in only slight injuries to Leonard E Sellar, the pilot.

The news even reached Portsmouth. But they couldn’t get the pilot’s name right. Portsmouth Evening News, 25 May 1927. Credit: BNA

On 25 May 1927 Leonard Falla set off from Renfrew Aerodrome in his Bristol Type 89A Jupiter Advanced Trainer. He was flying over the city of Glasgow when his plane developed engine trouble. Searching for a suitable landing place, he eyed up the tracks north of Pollokshields East railway station, which were a lot wider then than now. However he caught his right wing on a large signal post, demolishing it, and spun round to crash on the embankment, apparently in a railwayman’s garden. He came to rest opposite the art nouveau Millar & Lang’s Printworks (now McCormick House) on Darnley Street. Excited onlookers were amazed to see the pilot escape with little more than an injury to his nose, and to his pride. He was taken to the infirmary but later released .

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