glasgow construction industry

[sonnyj99]

hi

does anyone know of where to get information about the construction / property industry before the 1st world war?

i have often wondered what contractors built the tenements? are any still around? were these private developments or council houses? if private were they speculative developments? on the basis that most people did not own their home back then, who did own these buildings? if the council owned when / why were they sold off?
do any pictures exist during construction? why were there no basements built? who designed them? what happened to the architects / QS's / engineers etc?

i work in the industry and there does not seem to be much information about this sort of stuff online.

Cheers

[The Egg Man]

I don't know if it's of help but by 1935, a number of tenements around the Mitchell Library, built c 1896 were owned by The Findlay Trust Properties Ltd of 41 West George St.

[Dexter St. Clair]

http://www.scran.ac.uk/scotland/pdf/SP2_4Housing.pdf URBAN HOUSING IN SCOTLAND 1840-1940

[moonbeam]

A lot of pre WW1 housing ie the stone villas that abound, Tollcross, Sandyhills, Yoker, Newlands, Bishopbriggs, Bearsden etc.
were often speculative. Someone bought a "feu" from the land owner then contracted a builder
to build a semi or detached villa. The Glasgow Herald from the 1880s carries lots of adverts for these houses for
sale or rent. What I did find in some family research over a relation who got his fingers badly burnt ie he was a small
builder in 1908 but went out on his own and built some "villas" in the Clydebank area. Speculatively! World War 1 broke out
and the housing market collapsed and he went bankrupt. Ended up in the army as some sort of engineer in the service corps. He did make sergeant by 1918 but was around 47 years old by then! Part of his army pay was being deducted to pay his creditors! The land valuation rolls can be searched.

[Bridie]

Welcome to HG sonnyj99

One of HG's members - ibtg found these for me. There's not much technical detail, more sentimental, it was the tenements I knew in Possil and the house in Hillend St, Lambhill- both still there.

The history of housing in Glasgow is a very interesting subject, I'm doing an ancestry search just know and after finding details of the people the next interesting step is wanting to see the buildings/ streets where they lived that no longer exist.

[ibtg]

Hi, sonnyj99 - take a look at the book Tenements and Towers, available in the Mitchell and probably other libraries.

Also, I know some houses (red sandstone terraces) were built in the Queen Victoria Park (Jordanhill) area for private sale. Same fate of war befell the builder and the Council bought them for renting out. Since the Right to Buy, most, if not all, are back in private ownership.

[engineer]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Builders-Mactaggart-Scottish-Housebuilding/dp/1902419081
http://www.macmic.co.uk/Homes/Heritage.aspx

some info from one of the few builders to survive this long