Thanks for the Memories: Remember the talk of the steamie?

This autumn, to mark the anniversary, the play is being revived at the King’s Theatre, with top Scots actresses Libby McArthur, Mary McCusker, Carmen Pieraccini and Fiona Wood in the famous roles of Dolly, Mrs Culfeathers, Magrit and Doreen.

The play struck a chord with people all over Glasgow who remember the city’s famous steamies.

The story is set in a Glasgow wash house on Hogmanay, where the women are trying to get their washing done before the bells and it became a legendary commentary on life in Glasgow in the 1950s, set in a place different generations gathered.

It has since delighted and entertained audiences all over the world and a TV version, made by Scottish Television in 1988, has been repeated several times over the years.

Do you remember the old steamies? Perhaps your mother or grandmother used to share stories of what it was like? Do you remember visiting as a child?

They were the first community ‘hubs’ where women got out of the house and got together with others to gossip and support each other.

(It’s also said it may have inspired James Watt, who used to stroll around Glasgow Green. Born in Greenock in 1736, Watt was first struck by the power of steam as a 15-year-old, as he sat and watched a kettle boil. But it was not until 1765, when Watt was a 29-year-old technician at Glasgow University, that the twin rooms of the Glasgow steamie inspired him to improve on the early, hopelessly inefficient Newcomen steam engine.

Watt later described going for a stroll on the Green one ‘’fine sabbath afternoon’’, thinking about how to better the design. A few yards past the wash- house, he said ‘’the whole thing was arranged in my mind’’.

Experts reckon it’s too much of a coincidence that the two events were not connected as, at the time, the building consisted of two large steam-filled rooms, each seating about 200 women and their wash tubs, either side of a chimney stack.

Watt’s answer for the engine was to add a second chamber, or condenser, mirroring the design of the building.

Whatever was going outside the steamie, it was hard graft inside. The People’s Palace on Glasgow Green, not far from one of the old steamies – lets visitors have a go at the mangle and it is no easy task.

The museum’s popular display explains the history of public baths and wash houses, which opened across the city in the early 20th century and shows the small stall place and equipment used long before the days of washing machines and electric irons.

They were set up with stalls, where women would bring the weekly washing to clean by hand. It was also a place where women could catch up with friends and gossip, giving rise to the phrase “you’ll be the talk of the steamie!”

Maybe you recall the Oatlands Wash House and Public Baths at Fauldhouse Street? It’s said this steamie offered another perk, because its wall on to Wolseley Street was always warm from the boilers, so it was a great place to stand on a cold day. It even had the nickname the ‘Hot Wa’.

At our recent Thanks for the Memories events across the city, visits to the steamie were mentioned regularly.

In Bridgeton, for example, the McLellan sisters May, now 75 and Betty, 76, recall 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.”

Penny Anderson also came along to tell us about her Words of Washerwomen art project, inspired by the women who used the steamies and hung their laundry out to dry at the clothes poles on Glasgow Green.

Govanhill Baths published a short book, called Our Steamie, in 2016 at Glasgow Women’s Library, which also captured memories of and writings inspired by the old wash houses.

The Steamie will run from Monday October 23 until Saturday November 4 at the King’s.