Albany Burns Club (aka Glasgow Albany Burns Club)

Overview The Albany Burns Club was founded by a few members of the soon-to-be-defunct Albany Bowling Club in order ‘[t]o keep up the old and valued friendships that were made on its turn’ (‘Club Notes’, ‘ALBANY BURNS CLUB’, in Annual Read More …

Albion Mutual Improvement Union

Overview The evidence for this society comes from the syllabus for the Spring 1862 session and from the three extant issues of a magazine produced in manuscript by its members (see ‘Additional Notes’ below). The ‘Order of Readers’ at the Read More …

Anderston Social Club (not the same as the Anderston Club)

Overview Anderston is an area just over a mile to the west of Glasgow’s city centre. (For more information about this area, see Michael Moss’s article, ‘Industrial Revolution: 1770s to 1830s. Neighbourhoods. Anderston‘ on The Glasgow Story website). According to John M’Dowall, Read More …

Auld Clinkum Burns Club

Overview There is very little currently known about this club. According to the Annual Burns Chronicle and Club Directory, members met on the first Saturday of each month at an establishment on St. Vincent Street (to the west of the Read More …

Bank Burns Club

Overview This Burns club met weekly on Saturday evenings at Mrs. M’Arthur’s in 1883, later the Club Rooms at M’Culloch’s in 1892, both of which are listed as 109 Argyle Street, before moving in 1896 (at least) to Whyte and Read More …

Barns O’ Clyde Burns Club, Clydebank

Overview Clydebank is located to the west of Glasgow and is situated on the north of the River Clyde. The Visit Scotland website offers a brief history of the area: ‘Clydebank is the historic heartland of the Scottish shipbuilding industry […] During Read More …

Bridgeton Burns Club

Overview Bridgeton is an area to the east of Glasgow’s city centre. (For more information about this area, see Gordon Adams’s chapter, [Bridgeton & Dalmarnock], ‘Historical Background‘, on the East Glasgow History website.) The Bridgeton Burns Club’s website gives the group’s earliest Read More …

City of Glasgow Literary Society

Overview The object of this society was its members’ intellectual improvement through the reading and discussion of essays written by society members, but this was to exclude the subject of religious doctrine.   A couple of examples of the essays Read More …

Co-operative Burns Club

Overview This Burns club met on the first Saturday of each month between October and May at 8pm. Its meetings were held at various local restaurants (e.g. in Room No. 10 at M’Culloch’s Restaurant, Croy place, 9 Maxwell Street, at Read More …

Dennistoun Jolly Beggars Burns Club

Overview Dennistoun is an area located to the east of Glasgow’s city centre. (For more information about this area, see Ian R. Mitchell’s article, ‘Dennistoun: No Mean Streets‘ on the Glasgow West End website). There is not much currently known about this Read More …

Eglinton Young Men’s Literary Association

Overview This group belonged to the Eglinton Congregational Church, which was located on 341 Eglinton Street, south of the River Clyde, in the Laurieston area. (For more information on this area, see ‘Gorbals, Glasgow. Laurieston Guide‘ on the ScotCities website). Designed by John Read More …

Gas Workmen’s Institution

Overview The information on this society comes from two issues of The Glasgow Mechanics’ Magazine. The May 7th issue for 1825 provides a good overview of this group: ‘The Gas Workmen’s Institution. – Out of these public associations has arisen Read More …

Glasgow Addisonian Literary Society

Overview Alexander Smith (1829-1867) was a well-known working-class Scottish poet, and was one of the founding members and Secretary of this society. (For more information on Smith, see, for example, ‘Alexander Smith (1829 – 1867)‘ on the Scottish Poetry Library Read More …

Glasgow Ballad Club

Overview The founder and first President of this club was William Freeland, who served from 1876 to 1903. There were 11 original members. The Glasgow Post Office directory for 1902-1903 gives a good overview of this club and its activities: Read More …

Glasgow Bute Literary Institute

Overview Bute, or the Isle of Bute, is an island in the Firth of Clyde. Bute is also a county that comprises this island and number of surrounding islands. This society is a type of nineteenth-century county association. In the stricter Read More …

Glasgow Clerical Literary Society

Overview This society is particularly interesting as some of its members were ministers of churches that later ‘came out’ in 1843; that is, their congregations broke away from the established church in what is known as the Disruption of 1843, Read More …

Glasgow Coleridge Club

Overview There is very little information currently known about this society. The only details we have come from the minutes of the Glasgow Addisonian Literary Society, a group discussed in Simon Berry’s Applauding Thunder (2013). According to Berry, in 1848, Read More …

Glasgow Shakspere Club

Overview This club was formed in Glasgow as it was thought there was a need for the city to have its own society similar to the ones then running in Edinburgh and beyond. The object of the club was to Read More …

Glasgow United Young Men’s Christian Association

Overview The Glasgow Young Men’s Society for Religious Improvement was founded in 1824. In 1877, it amalgamated with the Glasgow Young Men’s Christian Association (aka the G.Y.M.C.A., instituted in 1841, but this date is debatable) to become the Glasgow United Read More …

Glasgow University Dialectic Society

Overview The online catalogue of the University of Glasgow Archives Services, Archives Hub, offers a summary of this society and its activities: ‘Administrative / Biographical History Glasgow University Dialectic Society was instituted in 1861 at the University of Glasgow, Scotland, Read More …

Glasgow Young Men’s Christian Association

Overview The Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) was formed in London in 1841. (For a history of this association, see ‘History and Heritage’, on the YMCA website.) There is a discrepancy in the records as to the start date of the Glasgow Read More …

Glasgow Young Men’s Society for Religious Improvement

Overview This society was instituted in 1824. In 1877, it amalgamated with the Glasgow Young Men’s Christian Association (aka G.Y.M.C.A., instituted in 1841, although this date is debatable) to become the Glasgow United Young Men’s Christian Association in 1877. In Read More …

Holyrood Literary Society

Overview This group is an interesting example of a literary society whose history was not straight-forward, being the result of alliances made and broken — societies being formed, amalgamated with other societies, dissolved and/or re-formed as new clubs — over Read More …

Hope Street Free Gaelic Church Literary Society

Overview This society was made up of young men from the congregation of the Hope Street Free Gaelic Church. (For more information on this church, see ‘Glasgow — Hope Street‘ on the Ecclegen website, and ‘Glasgow, 58 Waterloo Street, Gaelic Free Church‘ on Read More …

Literary and Commercial Society of Glasgow

Overview The Glasgow Literary Society was founded in 1752 and changed its name at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the Literary and Commercial Society of Glasgow. They changed premises as well, moving from the University of Glasgow (at Read More …

Literary Debating Society

Overview The information that we have on this society comes from the magazine that was produced by the group members (see ‘Additional Notes’ below). In the three issues that were produced, there is no mention of how often the group Read More …

New Literary and Philosophical Society

Overview The formation of this new group is discussed in an article published in 1824 that also included a summary of a number of different Glasgow literary societies. The foundations of New Literary and Philosophical Society were laid out at Read More …

Original Union Club

Overview 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 Read More …

Palaver Society

Overview The first meeting of this society was held at the Ramshorn Inn (which might be the same as the Ramshorn Bar, 437 Arglye Street, in the city centre) at the end of May 1831. (For more information on this Read More …

Partick Burns Club

Overview Partick is an area in the West End of Glasgow. (For more information on this area, see the entry for ‘Partick, Glasgow. Origins & History‘ on the ScotCities website). This was a fairly large Burns club, having 213 members in 1896. Membership Read More …

Sandyford Burns Club

Overview Sandyford is an area located just to the west of Charing Cross. The Glasgow and District Burns Association website gives a brief history of the founding of this club: ‘The clubs’ [sic] motto is taken from the poem “Contented Wi Read More …

St. Rollox Burns Club

Overview St. Rollox was located in the north of the city in the Springburn area. The area was home of the St Rollox Railway Works, and St Rollox Chemical Works, which was reportedly the largest in Europe. (For more information on Read More …

The Thirteen Club (aka The Glasgow Thirteen)

Overview From the start, this club was intended to have a small, exclusive membership limited to 13 members. Discussions were to be on literature and art. The first meeting was held on Friday, 15 January 1891 at Moir’s Restaurant on Read More …

Wellpark Free Church Literary Society

Overview The Wellpark Free Church was located in Dennistoun, an area in the east end of the city. (For more information about this church, see ‘Glasgow — Wellpark‘ on the Ecclegen website, and Gordon Adams’s article, ‘Wellpark Church of Scotland‘ on the East Glasgow Read More …

Western Scientific Association

Overview The information that we have on this society comes solely from a newspaper article attributed to Thomas Lugton and written over fifty years after the group’s last recorded activity. The article states that this association was founded in 1843 Read More …