A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

Post by down south »

While we're reviving old topics :wink: , here are a few extra adverts of relevance that I've come across.

This one reminded me, which I'd forgotten , that Macleans the chemist in Dockhead Street changed hands around the end of the 1960s. Wonder if this " McPherson " was any relation of P K Macpherson,the chemists in Hamilton Street.
M G McPherson chemist 1970.jpg
The address of this opticians, advertising in March 1972 , suggests that it was above Taylor's the chemists at 94 Dockhead Street, quite a suitable location.
Morrison opticians March 1972.jpg
And here's another church which I don't think we've ever mentioned, the Pentecostal Church in Union Street. This advert dates from June 1967.
Pentecostal Church 1967.jpg
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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A few other Saltcoats businesses of the 1960s and 1970s that haven't yet found their way into the Stroll; gleaned occasionally from the 1967 phone book, but mostly from the 1970 Yellow Pages .

And pride of place must go to Rennie and Watson, architects, at No 12a Hamilton Street, responsible for many of the prominent local buildings that were newly constructed in that era; not that they haven't had a mention elsewhere...see here for detailed information on the firm provided by proud daughter Avril Rennie.

Also based in Hamilton Street were
Brunton , Miller, Alexander and Martin, solicitors, at No 6a ( this in 1970; in 1967 this solicitor's practice was listed as Robert McCallum );
Neil Fullarton & Co, accountants, at No 31;
and W W Blair and Sons, carriers, at No 56.

In Wellpark Road at No 2 was J Whyte, general merchant; while other corner-type shops listed in Springvale Street were
William Wilson, grocer at No 18;
R & M Nicol, grocer, at No 44;
and Mrs Margaret Gray, newsagent, variously listed as at No 40 or 48 ( I suspect one of them will have been a misprint ).
Wilson's will be the one on the corner of Glebe street mentioned by Sam here.

Mikfitz gave us an excellent list of shops that he remembered being at Old Raise Road here. From the directories I've found a few other names that were there in the late 1960s and early 1970s:
Mrs S Murray, general merchant, at No 1 ( which presumably won't have been one of the main grouping );
A Walker, grocer, at No 15;
Mrs M M A Armstrong, draper, at No 17;
and at No 43, in 1967 Miss Edith Best, hairdresser, changing to A Smith by 1970.
I would guess Miss Best may have been a relative of the Bests who had the other shops Mikefitz mentioned, the address of which was No 29; Tommy Murphy was at No 23, Hadden the chemist at No 33 and the Piacentinis' Cafe Colette at No 35.

In Wheatley Road, as well as Hendry's newsagent and off-licence at No 10, there was also J Crawford, grocer, at No 8 , and Tortolano's cafe ( an offshoot of the Melbourne ) at No 18 .

And some other shops or businesses listed out in the suburbs included
Tom's Ices, 34 Middlepart Crescent;
J M Wilson, greeting card shop, at 31 Corrie Crescent;
C Wilder, bookmaker, at 34 McKillop Place;
and J Brown, clock and watch maker, at 41 Ivanhoe Drive.

A few more another time.

Susan
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Here now are some of the local tradesmen not previously mentioned.

Beginning with the firm of Robert McCallum & Son ( any relation, Hughie ? ): plasterers, tile layers and workers in cement and concrete. A business that dated back at least as far as the 1903 directory, where Robert McCallum, plasterer, was listed at both Hamilton Street and Eglinton Place, and it didn't move very far in the next sixty years, with this advert showing it headquartered at 4 Melbourne Terrace in 1963:
Robert McCallum 1963.jpg
But there seems to have been a change and a move to 5 Stanley Road later in the decade, with the name reverting to plain Robert McCallum.

Other plasterers listed were
W & H Brown, 20 Ross Road
Kent & McVey, 5 Ross Road
W Sinclair & Sons, 5 Halkett Place

Receipts now for a couple of tradesmen our household had dealings with in 1963. Here's the one for R Gray, painter and decorator, then in business at Wellpark Road ( the corner being damaged, I'm not quite sure of the address...it could be No 5, but more likely fifty-something ) :
Robert Gray 1963.jpg
In the 1967 phone book though he is at Kerelaw Cottage, Glencairn Street ; and by 1970 he had moved again to 28 Caledonia Road. We've already mentioned one of the other main painters and decorators listed, McBroom's of Green Street; and there was also J&J Black, 10 Dykes Place.

Another interesting related listing was of the Amalgamated Society of Painters and Decorators; apparently that union had its headquarters for Glasgow and hinterland at the unlikely spot of 7 Wheatley Drive, Saltcoats.

The other receipt I have is for Hindmarsh and Young: glaziers, joiners and undertakers of 9 Hill Street.
Hindmarsh & Young 1963.jpg
There had been a change of name, and perhaps of hands, by 1967/70, to West Coast Joinery at the same address.

Other joiners listed were Douglas Peebles & Son Ltd at Factory Place and A C Shedden of Windmill Street ( both already mentioned ) and G McCafferty, 34 Sidney Street. ( McCauley's didn't make it into the phone book ).

There was also still an undertaker , Robert Donaldson, listed at 9 Manse Street, roughly where R B Reid had previously long been in business ( see here ).

Susan
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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down south wrote:Here now are some of the local tradesmen not previously mentioned.

Beginning with the firm of Robert McCallum & Son ( any relation, Hughie ? ): plasterers, tile layers and workers in cement and concrete. A business that dated back at least as far as the 1903 directory, where Robert McCallum, plasterer, was listed at both Hamilton Street and Eglinton Place,
Hi Susan,
My McCallum ancestors and the ancestors of the above McCallum family, though unrelated lived at the same address - it would have been a tenement during the 1891 census. See attached image from my research BC (before computers) :wink:
Image
Also a bit of detail into that family when I thought we were related: see this topic. My father's sister, Annie McCallum was married a plaster, William from that family - I've a very vague memory of him coming to our house.
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Thank you, Hughie; very interesting. No shortage of McCallums locally, that's clear....

And here's another McCallum firm from the 1960s/70s I've come across: James McCallum and Sons, carriers, contractors and coal merchants of 27 High Road.

Other coal merchants not already mentioned were J Donald of 10 Glencairn Street; and C Hammond of 37 Gladstone Road, who seems by this receipt to have succeeded to Nixon's Saltcoats trade when they moved out of the coal business.
Hammond coal 1964.jpg
Further builders and contractors listed were
H Miller and Sons, builders, of 39 Raise Street
W Fisher, demolition contractor, 55 Mayfield Road

and electrical contractors J F Massie of 54 Parkend Road, and Strathclyde Electrical Co of 22 Eglinton Street.

And returning to other tradesmen, there were plenty of plumbers:

J Bain, 6 Nelson Road
J Blair & Son, 2 Gladstone Road
J G Hunter, 54a Hamilton Street
A B Kennedy, 40 Caledonia Road
A McAllister, 21 Stanley Road

Slaters, apart from McGinn's, were J Hainey, 46 Adams Avenue, and J Simmonds, 210 High Road.

And there was also an upholsterer: A Millar of 7 Christie Gardens.

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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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down south wrote: W Fisher, demolition contractor, 55 Mayfield Road
Susan
Willie Fisher, had his yard next to our house in the Boglemart. It was actually in the Gasworks Close, the lane off Boglemart St. up to the gasworks.

JD.
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Dad worked for a while with the Fisher demolition company in the late 1950s. I recall wheeling my boagie with timber to our home in Whitlees Crescent for our living room fire - the timber was from houses they were demolishing in Kilmahew Street.
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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There were time when I could cheerfully have set fire to Fisher's workshop.
Old Jock Breen (who incidentally was married to my great-aunt) used to stand in the lane and take all the old nails out of the joists the men had take out of the demolished houses. He just left them lying on the ground and they caused lots of punctures to our bikes.

Happy days.

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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Delighted to see that even my scrapings from the bottom of the 1960s Saltcoats barrel are striking a few interesting chords....you just never know what's going to produce a response. :D

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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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Saltcoats wasn't noted for its industries by the time of the 1960s and 1970s; they were all in Ardrossan and Stevenston.The only Saltcoats one of any substance I can think of is Glenhusky. So I was surprised to come across this advert in the 1970 yellow pages:
Ailsa Industrial Furnaces 1970.jpg
Anyone ever heard of it ? Unfortunately no address is given. I suppose like McCrindle's at that time it could have had its business address in Saltcoats but had its actual works in Ardrossan.

There were of course a few smaller-scale industrial conglomerates :wink: in the town; I see Willie Bond of Bond's Pond fame is listed at Glebe Street and Links Road for his firelighter and bleach businesses mentioned by Sam in the link , grandly described as " manufacturer " of both.

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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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down south wrote: A B Kennedy, 40 Caledonia Road
Susan
I shared a flat with his son Barclay when we were research students at Glasgow University. He was more interested in getting a 'blue' in athletics than in his research. As a result he did not complete his Ph.D. but got a job with ICI in the nylon plant. I carried on and got married soon after and we lost touch.
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Re: A Stroll round 1960s Saltcoats

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This picture, dating from August 1974, shows some people you might have met in the 1960s when visiting the Saltcoats Gas Showroom at 14 Hamilton Street:
Saltcoats gas employees 1974.jpg
And a couple of other miscellaneous notes:

The Saltcoats branch of the British Legion was at 78 Argyle Road.

And the Saltcoats district nurses had their headquarters at 13 Jacks Road. ( The Ardrossan nurses, incidentally, were at 18 McKellar Avenue; and the Stevenston ones at 57 Shore road. )

Susan
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