SINCE the launch of our Thanks for the Memories series, readers have been sharing their stories and photographs of old Glasgow.

Willie Sinclair, 72, who was born and brought up in Bridgeton, recalls his dad’s musical career.

“My dad – also William – played guitar for a group called Lelanie and her Hawaiian playboys,” he laughs.

“It was like nothing you’d seen before.

“He also toured with the great Lex McLean. We were quite a musical family – my brother Joe was a drummer and I saw him perform at the Empire.”

He smiles: “We’d go busking to make some extra money – but not round Bridgeton, in case the means-testing people were watching.”

Willie remembers the shops that used to line the streets of Bridgeton all the way up to Rutherglen.

“There was Mrs Allan’s Dairy, a fruit and veg shop and Irish Maggie’s newsagent where you went for ginger beer on a Sunday morning,” he says.

“We used to laugh about the undertaker called Matthew Bones.”

John and Rosemary Keery also have happy memories of growing up in Bridgeton.

“I was born in Heron Street, which wasn’t fancy-dancy like it is now,” grins John, 75, adding: “And Rosemary was born in her gran’s house on the South Side and moved to Orr Street when she was small.

“We didn’t meet up until much later on. We played at the Bully, the railway shunting yard – we didn’t need adventure playgrounds in those days. You just played on the trains until you got caught.”

Rosemary, whose maiden name was Horn, was one of five children and her father Willie was a dispatch rider during the war.

“The highlight of our week was going to the wee Royal, the cinema, using our jam jars to get in and sitting crammed on wee wooden benches watching the film,” she smiles.

“We watched all the old cowboy films, the Zorro movies, the Roy Rogers pictures, and come out slapping our thighs and yee-ha-ing and thinking we were cowboys…happy, happy memories.”

May McLellan, 75, and her sister Betty, 76, were brought up on Nuneaton Street in Bridgeton.

“We went on the trams – I still have an old ticket – and played all the old street games – skipping, peever, whippin’ peerie…we were always outdoors,” smiles May, whose married name is Brown.

“We went down to the saunie pon’ (sandy pond) and it felt like you were away on your holidays!

“Our mum, Lizzie was a housewife, and our dad Duncan was a steelworker at Tollcross.

“We slept in a bed cabinet in a room and kitchen.”

One of the McLellan sisters’ favourite memories is of a visit to the steamie at Templeton’s on Glasgow Green.

“There was a big open air pool for the weans to swim in as the mums did the washing,” says Betty.

“But the water was so cold and dirty that once you had been in for a swim your mum had to plonk you in the big sink straight after for a proper bath.”

She smiles: “Times were tough, but they were happy.”

Sadie Kerr, 88, recalls what it was like to live in Bridgeton during the war.

“I must have been about 12 or 13 when the power station was bombed and it was a scary time,” she says.

“We had to carry our gas masks to school and if we forgot, we got the strap.

“I went to Queen Mary Street school and I remember all the drills, and hearing the sirens.”

She adds: “When the sirens sounded, all the closes were shored up and you had to take a torch out with you, it was so pitch black.

“On a bright, moonlit night, you’d hear the planes above and wonder – are we going to be next? Will the bombs fall on us?”

In the Gorbals, John Wright, 82, also recalls the war years.

“It’s the darkness I remember – the black-out wardens and the way you had to close up every bit of light,” he says.

“And all the men signed up or, if they didn’t go to war, they would be part of the home guard. Every family was affected.”

John lived in a single end in the Gorbals until he was 12.

“I remember you could get a wee runaround in the horse and cart if you paid the man tuppence, and I loved visiting the splendid library on McNeil Street,” he says.

“The Gorbals was like a little village, with the dance hall and the cinema and the shops, and you had the Green on your doorstep with the steamie and the open air baths.

“I moved to Toryglen when I was older but I always came back to visit my grandmother in the Gorbals. I’ve always had an affinity with the  place.”
He smiles: “I’ll always remember the tremendous camaraderie here, especially during the war years. This is where I always called home.”