There is a long standing KILKIE tradition of supporting Celtic football club - which is not surprising given the historical origin of the team for Glasgow Irish immigrants. Not all Kilkie family support Celtic but a very high percentage do! As far as is known no Kilkie played for Celtic, but we have sure spent a lot of money watching them.

Parents were always short of money where I grew up in Glasgow. Buying clothes for school or presents for Christmas was always a struggle and often meant getting things on "tick" (credit).
There were a  number of forms of tick, some peculiar to Scotland, some quite common. One way of doing it was to shop at a place that ran its own credit scheme.

Another method popular with working class families was to use "Provident Vouchers". These still exist and work in the same way they always did - you buy vouchers and take them to shops where they are accepted and buy things. You pay the company back a certain amount per week with interest.

Happy birthday!

The Clyde tunnel is 50 years old today (Sunday 7 July 2013). Sad news is that I remember the night it opened and in fact I travelled through the tunnel on that auspicious day.

When I was growing up the Govan fair was a big deal each year. Not only was Fair Friday itself a big thing but it also signalled the start of the Fair fortnight when my dad (and everybody else’s dad) had their annual holiday.

The Steamie was one of the centres of my family's life when we were growing up in Govan in the early 1960s.

The "steamie" was a public wash-house provided by Glasgow Corporation to let working classes have access to hot water and washing and drying facilities that were beyond their normal means.