The 1960s was the era of major unemployment in the history of the city, as coal mines, street works and heavy industries went out of business. The crime rates were also high, especially the new youth gangs that were younger and more violent than the Razor gangs of the 1920s. The tram system was closed in 1962 On the final day of service, and there was a procession of 20 trams through the city, an event attended by 250,000 people. The shipbuilding industry on the River Clyde began to decline. The government started new high-rise towers and housing schemes to replace the tenement slums. Some of them were built outside of Glasgow in new towns such as Cumbernauld and East Kilbride.
These stunning photographs capture streets, roads, bridges, markets, and everyday life in Glasgow in the 1960s. Some photos also depict the life of Glasgow slums.
#1 Interior of John Dalglish & Sons Limited Company, 1962
#2 George Square, July 1967
#3 High Court of Justiciary from Glasgow Green, 1961
#4 Morris-Commercial Royal Mail Van, Sauchiehall Street, May 1961
#5 Rattray’s Cycle Depot, 7-11 Murray Street, September 1966
#6 Offices, The ‘Evening Citizen’, Albion Street, 1961
#7 On the ‘Blue Train’, 1968
#8 Sunset over Clydebank, 1961
#9 Cathedral interior, 1961
#10 Daniel Brown’s Restaurant, 79 St. Vincent Street, 1961
#11 McIvers Street Market, Kent Street, 1961
#12 Glasgow, 19 April 1960 St. Enoch Underground station is now (2010) a Caffe Nero.
#13 Renfrew Airport, 19 April 1960
#14 The Ingram Bar, 136 Queen Street, 1961
#15 Bowling Green, Kelvingrove Art Gallery & The University, 1961
#16 Gardens, Kelvingrove Park, 1961
#17 Interior of a fruit market, 1961
#18 Kelvingrove Art Gallery gardens, July 1967
#19 Glasgow, 19 April 1960 St. Enoch Underground station is now (2010) a Caffe Nero.
#20 Co-operative shop, possibly Westmuir Street, 1961
#21 Queen Victoria Fountain (The Doulton Fountain), People’s Palace, Glasgow Green, 1961
#22 The University, 1961
#23 Kelvingrove Art Gallery gardens, July 1967
#24 Argyle Street, Lewis’s huge department store in the background
#25 Boots store, junction of Jamaica Street and Argyle Street, 1961
#26 Girls on the hill, April 1962
#27 Crossing Argyle Street at junction with Buchanan Street, 1961
#28 Presses, The ‘Evening Citizen’, Albion Street, 1961
#29 The Provand’s Lordship, July 1967
#30 Argyle Street looking west towards Anderston Cross
#31
#32 After the fire, Glasgow, 19 April 1960 This hugely destructive fire in the centre of Glasgow attracted wide national publicity.
#33 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#34 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#35 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#36 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#37 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#38 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#39 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#40 George Square, 19 April 1960
#41 A mother with her five children in poor housing in the notorious Gorbals district of Glasgow, 1969
#42 Actor Albert Finney in Glasgow, 3rd March 1963.
#43 Aerial view of Flyover, Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, Scotland, 22nd December 1965.
#44 Odeon Cinema, 52-62 Renfield Street, 1961
#45 Alex Munro (Butchers), Westmuir Street, 1961
#46 George Square, 1961
#47 Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, 1961
#48 Traffic on King George V Bridge, 1961
#49 Bowling, Dunbartonshire, River Clyde near, April 1962
#50 John Dalglish & Sons Limited, machinery manufacturer, Glasgow, April 1962
#51 Western SMT Bristol bus, Killermont Street, 1968
#52 In the Gorbals, 18 April 1960
#53 Sauchiehall Street, 19 April 1960
#54
#55 Paisley Cross, Scotland, 19 April 1960
#56 Buchanan Street, 19 April 1960
#57 Argyle Street, Glasgow city centre.Note the Mark 1 Coronation Tram.
#58
#59 After the fire, Glasgow, 19 April 1960
#60 The Cheapside fire. Brownie Bear: Yhe fire broke out on 28th March 1960 and continued to smoulder for the best part of a week. 14 members of Glasgow Fire Service died and 5 members of the Glasgow Salvage Corps also died.
#61 Illegal betting shop, 19 April 1960.
#62 Robert Henderson
#63 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#64 A mother and three little children in the interior of their flat in the notorious Gorbals district of Glasgow, 1969
#65 The exterior of slum housing in the notorious Gorbals district of Glasgow, 1969.
#66 Castlecary Train Crash, 1968
A light engine passed a signal at danger after a telephone misunderstanding with the signalman, and collided with a 12-carriage passenger train waiting at the next signal. The driver and secondman of the light engine were killed. Our Picture Shows: Doctor walks away from the cabin of the crashed diesel locomotive.
#67 Castlecary Train Crash, 1968
#68 Glasgow Hurricane, 1968
The twisted crane which collapsed at Sprigburn, Wellfield Street following high wind which hit Southern and Central Scotland in the early hours of the 15th January 1968. The collapsed crane caused residents in the locality to be evacuated. The storm brought havoc to the City leaving 700 people homeless and 9 people dead.
#69 View of the ocean liner Queen Elizabeth 2, owned by Cunard, being launched down the slipway at John Brown shipyard in Clydebank near Glasgow in Scotland on 20th September 1967.
#70 A train passes Kennishead station, in the foreground the scraps of timber which have been laid on the tracks for sabotage, in Glasgow, April 26, 1965.
#71 View from the south bank Laurieston and Gorbals area of the South Portland Street Suspension Bridge spanning the River Clyde in Glasgow, 1965.
#72 The Scott Monument, Cenotaph and Glasgow City Chambers on the eastern side of George Square in Glasgow, 1965.
#73 Three men play a game of lawn bowls on a bowling green in West End Park with the New Buildings of the University of Glasgow rising behind on Gilmorehill in Glasgow, 1965.
#74 Snow in Glasgow, 1961
#75 Former Celtic football players visit their former grounds. 26th March 1961.
#76 Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire – Glasgow, 1960s
#77 Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire – Glasgow, 1960s
#78 Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire. Tons of rubble and whisky barrels engulf a fire engine, on the morning after a disastrous Glasgow whisky warehouse blaze, 1960s
#79 Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire – Glasgow, 1960s
#80 Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire – Glasgow, 1960s
#81 A Glasgow man attracts a puzzled gaze by pulling a haggis behind him on a piece of string on the anniversary of Scots patriot Robert Burns, 1967
#82 The tenement of John Duddy in Stevenson Street, Calton, Glasgow (above the alley) where the 37 year old was arrested today in connection with the Shepherd’s Bush Murders in London
#83 Ian Brady in Glasgow, 1965
#84 Ian Brady in Glasgow, 1965
#85 Children watch as a torrent of water pours out of drains in a Glasgow street during severe floods throughout Scotland, 1964
#86 Police car equipped with a telephone loudspeaker unit, appeals for information in the village of Brill, Wednesday 14th August 1963.
#87 Great Train Robbery, 1963
1963 Great Train Robbery was the robbery of £2.6 million from a Royal Mail train heading from Glasgow to London on the West Coast Main Line in the early hours of 8th August 1963, at Bridego Railway Bridge, Ledburn, near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England. After tampering with the lineside signals in order to bring the train to a halt, a gang attacked the train; pictured: Postal Workers who were on robbed train, finally arrive at London Euston Station.
#88 Robbery Scene, 1963
#89 Investigation on the Attack of the Glasgow, 1963
#90 Glasgow, George Square, 1963
#91 The new approach to the Clyde tunnel in Glasgow which connects the districts of Whiteinch in the north to Govan in the South in the west of the city, 1963.
#92 The first of the Clyde tunnels near completion, November 1962.
#93 Glasgow Buchanan Street-Inverness express at Gleneagles behind a standard class, 1962
#94 Interior view of Celtic Park, home of Glasgow Celtic football club in Parkhead, May 1962.
#95 Exterior view of Celtic Park, home of Glasgow Celtic football club in Parkhead, 1962
#96 The British Bombadier Cargo ship towering over the surrounding warehouses at Clyde Dockyard, Glasgow, 1962
#97 Eleven years old Gorbals boy Willie Thomason still comes back to his old territory among the old tenements and watches the progress being made by workmen.
#98 Polmadie locomotive shed, Glasgow, 1962.
#99 England goalkeeper Gordon Banks, covered by Maurice Norman, saves from a Scotland attack spearheaded by Denis Law (left) in the international soccer match at Hampden Park.
#100 Flower seller, Buchanan Street, 1961
#101 George Square and City Chambers, 1961
#102 Weather – Good Friday Snow Storm – Glasgow, 1960s
#103 BEA Viscount at Renfrew Airport, 19 April 1960
#104 Gorbals, 19 April 1960
#105 Hutchesontown Redevelopment, 1966
#106 Disasters and Accidents – Cheapside Street Whisky Bond Fire – Glasgow, 1960s
Rubble chokes the narrow street as, hours after the outbreak, hoses still pump streams of water on to the smouldering ruins of a whisky warehouse in Glasgow. An explosion blew the walls of the building out, burying three fire appliances and killing nineteen men, fourteen firefighters, and five members of the Glasgow Salvage Corps.
I recognise some of these photographs and know that th uncredited photographer is Allan Hailstone. If you know the source/origin of the pictures it would be right to credit these.
I can’t believe how much cleaner the buildings are now. Those colored photos make them all look black.
Through the 1970s and 90s, Glasgow buildings were sandblasted to get rid of grime as part of a regeneration programme – when I tried to find when it started, I found an interesting thread on Hidden Glasgow. The odd black building you see today may have been missed or the building owner did not want to pay for it.
Thank you, that’s interesting! I think it’s Albert avenue number 78 that you can see on Google Street View. It’s probably an example of it being missed/rejected.
There are a couple of questions I have about the poster in the window and the guy casually standing with a framed landscape on Google maps.
I have seen muckier buildings, but that is a cracker. The straight lines between the tenements either side are particularly pettiness – no free sandblasting for Mr Stingy’s close, no danger!
Glasgow East Area Renewal (GEAR), which ran from 1976-1987, was one of the big projects to accomplish this.
I agree with you about the big clean-up. Many building owners, as well as the corporation (and later Strathclyde Council) gussied up nearly every building, whereas some building owners chose to keep the old polluted look (that’s what it was, pollution and soot. Decades of it).
The only part of Glasgow that’s cleaner now.
Great post I really enjoyed looking through the old photos
More trees
Basically no litter.