The History
Spending my pocket money at Cafe Deluxe or Betty Doyle’s on a Saturday when visiting my Grandparents on the Peat Road. Happy Times. It was in the 1970s- 1980s. I’d buy a comic from Betty Doyle’s and 1/4 of sugared almonds or midget gems or a toy from the café.’
Angie Magoo McGuire
I remember the Doyle’s very well, John, Betty, and Henry who was a schoolteacher up in Castlemilk. I think the school was Glenwood. They used to stay in with their parents in a tenement on Nitshill Road near the corner of Cleeves Road; they stayed upstairs from the Co-operative drapers, where the hotel was.’
Eddie Foy
My Dad had a fruit & veg shop between Remo’s Chip Shop and Donnie’s hairdressers. that was in the 1970s, then he moved the shop to Barrhead. I can’t remember the name of his shop, sorry. My Dad was Patrick (Pat) McGuire. He was from Priesthill/The Auld Scheme and Mum was Sheila Gourlay from the Peat Road.’
Angie Magoo McGuire
Whilst discussing their memories of Nitshill’s shops, Rab Donaldson told us: ‘I remember the fruit shop was a laundrette before the fruit shop.’ Colin Smith remembers ‘Esther's up at the square beside the Levern. Sure, it was a wee Jewish woman that owned it. The bakers was beside Ansari's (I can't remember its name), I think it was where Chilli’s is now. I used to get sent up for rolls on a Saturday morning (stayed in Peat Road beside Peat Road Motors) and could smell the bread all the way up. My mum's pal worked in it and we'd get sent back up for 10p ends (leftover cakes) and come back with full apple and rhubarb tarts.’ Drew Murray joined the conversion, saying ‘Victor’s bakery was also where the Turkish barber’s is now.’
Rab Donaldson, Colin Smith and Drew Murray
My favourite memories are visiting my aunt Margaret and uncle Tom, especially at New Year; we had great parties in Peat Road, Nitshill.’ The parties were very sociable, ‘…it was mostly sixties records and dancing, and aunts and uncles singing - always a great atmosphere.’
Ann Marie McDermott
Playing football on the red ash park in the Levern school. I stayed opposite it on Nitshill Road, and we got chased by the police quite often. I played with all the local boys, too many to name. They are all in the four corners of the world now, some have passed on now to play in the big park in the sky.’
Eddie Foy
Going down the woods, rafting from the Kennomeat factory to the bundy. Also, Johnny Walsh's wood yard. We built the rafts from thick sheets of polystyrene out of the Kennomeat factory. The rats in the burn were more scary than the rafting!’
Callum Murdoch
I remember jumping from piles of planks to play tig in Walshes…boardies on the Tarzan and Nitsie swing. Playing on the roundabout at Jimmy Hunter’s - the times I banged my head on the ground trying to look under it to see the stick some smart xxxx had put too far under. We had a great childhood.’
Frank Sloan
Eddie Foy and Callum Murdoch told us about playing at the ‘Ironie’, a pipe bridge across the River Levern. Colin Smith told us that he remembered: ‘Playing fitba and building dens up ‘the field’ behind Househillwood Road, Glenlora Drive and Newfield Square. As a kid it always seemed massive. Also crossing the ‘Ironie’ when going to school (Crookie) every day. Crossed it in all weathers, even snow and ice. Fell in once when the burn was quite high, came out in pain to discover a rat biting into my leg. Feart of them ever since…The remains [of the Ironie] are still there. It was a water pipe running from the factory across the burn, two girders either side joined by a few metal straps.’
Eddie Foy and Callum Murdoch
Going to the wee play park next to the Cavendish or the Levern Hotel to play with my cousins whilst their mum Jean Mackay went to play the arcade bingo with Grace Coyle. We just loved that park. There was a wee newsagent in the square that we got sweets from. My granny lived in Marvel Street and you took your life in your hands when driving up or down the road as all the dogs would chase the car tyres…Going to the bakery on the corner of Peat Road, asking for any brokies and handing over 2p. I lived in England and spent all my holidays there as my dad and all his family are from there. A lot of them still live there. Ahhh memories.’
Kathy Coyle Roy
We stayed in Pinmore Street when I was younger and I used to love it when it snowed and everyone from all the closes used to come out to build snowmen and igloos, and have snowball fights. Isobel Ross and her sister Tina used to help us kids. Then we all moved to Nitshill Road.’
Jane Mcbride
Favourite memory of Nitshill? Playing in the wood at back of Pinmore St. and rope swings over the burn. I lived in Pinmore till I was 17, great times, great neighbours.’
Drew Murray
I remember the wee newsagent was called ‘Beatrice’s’, and playing in the bricky and going to the orchard in the Nitshill woods in the summer, going up the dams. Telling all my mates about the Nitshill mining disaster before the monument was put up. I had seen it on a TV programme where they made a reconstruction of the disaster and nobody believed me, then a couple of months later they put the monument up. I was about 18 or 19 when I watched the Tv programme. It was on a show called ‘Windmill’, in 1985, hosted by Chris Serle. I have tried looking for it but no luck.’
Rab Donaldson
Aye, I can remember all of us goin up the dams,,,sometimes in our numbers, it was brilliant‘
Rab Scott
And guarding yer boniwid. Wood you collect for your bonfire. That was a round the clock job!’
Frank Sloan
Visiting my auntie Mary Anne and cousin Emily in the Co building in Dove Street, then my auntie Emily and uncle Eddie and cousins Emily and Barbara in Seamill Street most Sundays. Loved those days.’
May Gleed
When I was at Levern Primary, there was an empty house at the bottom corner of Pinmore Street on the Nitshill Road that we had been told was haunted. Me and James Dawson and a few others sneaked over at playtime and peeked through the letter box, only to see a coffin and what looked like a wedding dress draped over it covered in blood! So we told our teacher and the police were called in. Turned out to be an old sideboard with an old lace curtain covered in red paint!’
Rab Donaldson
Going to Jimmy Hunter’s van and the old yin’s wanting tick, telling you to go before them saying they want to speak to Jimmy about something.’
Stevie Docherty
Catching bees over the bricky, playing “soldiers” over the bricky and then when the school was built there I can remember games of football of upto 15 a side on the red ash pitch. Loved all the street games in house hill muir road (top end) Kirby, hide n seek. it would have been around 1976 onwards. I was eight. We had a great community spirit. Great memories.’
Rab Scott
One summer, during the school holidays, I was up there on my bike and bumped into a couple of lads playing in the street. I hadn’t known them before but they were friendly enough and we started playing every day of that summer. After school went back, I never saw them again, but I never forgot the family name. It’s weird how things like that stick in your mind.
Tony McGuire
Going to the Railway Inn for a carryoot... Plenty o’ pubs then. Great memories in Nitshill, yes, the Volunteer Arms, the Levern Water Hotel, the Cavendish Bar, the Royal Oak, the Househill Tavern… great memories in all of these pubs. Taking the fifth on some stories!'
David Brown
I went to Levern Primary and, in the winter, we would make slides from the grass inside the railings down onto the gravel. I remember using my school bag to sit on and ripped it to bits!
My Dad, John McDowell must have frequented every pub in Nitshill but his favourite was the Royal Oak. He would get dressed on a Saturday morning (suit and tie) and come home at 2pm when it shut, pie-eyed. My Mum and I would watch for him coming down Peat Road and we would cross the road for the bus up the town! Happy days.
Christine Mcneill