There is very little information currently known about this club. The information that we have comes from a newspaper clipping from the ‘Times’, possibly the Glasgow Evening Times. This newspaper article was placed in a scrapbook complied by William Young (1845-1916). Young was a Glasgow artist and his series of scrapbooks are housed in the Mitchell Library.

The article was written many years after the Original Union Club had ceased to exist, and the author  claims to be using information from the club minute book, which is apparently to hand. Unfortunately, it appears that the minutes and the scrapbook of original poetry he describes have not survived.

According to this anonymous author of the article, ‘Old Glasgow Poets’ Club’, the Original Union Club was more of a social drinking club that met in the Pope’s Eye Tavern in 1831 and 1832 (at least). The club business was to raise frequent toasts, and to read original poetry aloud to the group. If the poems passed muster, they would be recorded into a club scrapbook (see ‘Additional Notes’ below). A list of former members is provided, and the ‘chief poets’ of the club are identified, all of whom were either Whigs or Tories, there being ‘no Radicals present’.

Date of Existence

1831?-?

Source of Information

(Newspaper clipping, annotated:) ‘Times. 9 Dec. 1908’ [‘Old Glasgow Poets’ Club’]

Repository

Mitchell Library Special Collections

Reference Number

Young’s Scrapbooks, Vol. 21, p. 54

Additional Notes

See also entry for Original Union Club (Title currently unknown, ‘MS scrapbook of verse’), on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds.

Overnewton was part of the Yorkhill area in the West End of Glasgow, located roughly across the road from the grounds of the Kelvingrove Museum. It is currently unknown if this group was associated with the Overnewton Public School on Lumsden Street, or the Emmanuel Congregational Church, which was located on Overnewton Square. (For more information on the Overnewton Public School, see the entry for ‘Kelvin School for the Partially Sighted‘ on The Glasgow Story website).

The information on this club comes from the group’s own newspaper — or rather, their magazine, as members called it — that was written by and for the members (see ‘Additional Notes’ below).

The club met weekly on Saturday evenings to hear talks about an eclectic range of subjects, as per the norm with literary societies in the nineteenth century. In addition, there was a political debate, a ‘Hat Night’ — wherein members drew topics from a hat and had to speak  extempore for a set amount of time — and a social evening on the syllabus between January and March 1901.

Date of Existence

1901?-?

Source of Information

The Overnewton Whisper, No. 2, 26 February 1901

Repository

Mitchell Library Special Collections

Reference Number

Mitchell (GC) CD f072 91445 OVE

Additional Notes

See also entry for The Overnewton Whisper on our sister website, Literary Bonds.