Bessie Gow was a young shop assistant who lived in Strathbungo with her family in the 1920s. So how did she briefly achieve world-wide attention and notoriety? And a suspect in what was dubbed “The Crime of the Century”?

Thanks to Paul Sweeney, MSP, who first brought Bessie’s Strathbungo origins to my attention on X (ex Twitter). The prompt was this photo from the Glasgow City Archives of a newsagent in Balornock, featuring, if you look closely, the 4 August 1932 billboard “Betty Gow on the way to Glasgow”.

Small newsagent in a shed, elderly man and child in doorway, Betty Gow billboard outside

Crawford’s Newsagent, Campsie St, Balornock. Note the billboard on the left. Source: GCA C5656

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