JAMES TASSIE, 
Born in Pollokshaws on the 15th of July 1735, was the eldest son
and fourth child in a family of twelve. He began his working life
as a stonemason but, having artistic ability, he became a part time
student in the Academy of Fine Arts in Glasgow. It is evident that
he also acquired an adequate general and scientific education, for
in 1763 he went to Dublin as a laboratory assistant to a Professor
of Physics, with whom he developed a new process for making cameos.
They used an easily fusible white vitreous paste with some of the
characteristics of glass and far superior to any in use at that time
or since. In 1766, with this knowledge and his considerable artistic
talent, Tassie went to London where, after a brief period of difficulty,
he became established as a maker of quality cameos and intaglios.
A cameo is an embossed profile likeness of an individual that fulfils
the same purpose as a photograph today. These were in great demand,
with rich people sitting for them as they would for a painting. While
depicting people's heads in profile was the usual practice, one exception
was the cameo of William Pitt, the Prime Minister, where the subject
is portrayed three-quarter face. There was great demand for cameos
of prominent people both living and dead, the latter being taken
from paintings or busts. Intaglios were gemstones engraved with classical
or contemporary designs or symbols.
Samples of Tassie's work were exhibited annually over twenty years at the Royal
Academy and his fame spread far afield. In 1781 Catherine the Great, Empress
of Russia, ordered a collection of his work, which was completed in 1793
and consisted of 15,000 items. This collection is now housed in a
special room in the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad. James Tassie died
in 1799, and was succeeded in the business by his nephew William
Tassie who, in time, bequeathed 16,000 specimens of his uncle's work
to the National Gallery of Scotland. Many examples are exhibited
in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and a selection can be
seen in the Huntarian and the Peoples Palace Museums in Glasgow.
ALLAN GLEN
Was
born in Pollokshaws in 1778. When he died in 1850 he bequeathed £22,000 for
the 'Practical Education for Boys', and a school named after him was founded
in Cathedral Street in 1854.
WILLIAM COLLINS
Was born in Pollokshaws in 1789. He later attended
the Parish School until he was twelve years of age, then became an apprentice
weaver in a cotton mill. He was a clever lad and within six years he was
a clerk in the mill and was giving voluntary tuition to his co-workers, religious
instruction on Sundays and elementary education on weekday evenings. By the
age of twenty-five he was a teacher in Glasgow and an elder in the Tron Kirk,
the minister of which, the Rev. Stephen McGill (previously minister of Eastwood
Church) helped him to establish a private school in the city. Five years
later, in 1819, William Collins, again with the help of Mr. McGill, opened
a bookshop and made a humble venture into publishing. The venture prospered,
and thus was founded the great publishing concern of William Collins Sons & Co.
Ltd., one of the largest in the world until recent years.
BETTY THOMSON
Daughter of Robert Burns, Scotland's National Bard,
married John Thomson who had been a soldier, then was a handloom weaver in Pollokshaws.
They are reputed to have lived in Shawlands in a building that stood between
Abbot Street and the present day Minard Road, but latterly lived in Pollokshaws.
Betty Burns was born in 1790, and when she died in 1873 she was buried in the
Old Vennel graveyard where her tombstone can be seen. She had a daughter, Margaret,
who married David Wingate a Pollokshaws weaver and poet of some local fame.
THE RIGHT REVEREND MATTHEW STEWART DD,
Moderator of the General
Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1947, was born in Pollokshaws and baptised
in the Pollokshaws Parish Church of which his parents were members.
JOHN McLEAN
Was born at
59 King Street, Pollokshaws in 1879. His father was a potter at Lockhart's Victoria
Pottery in Cogan Street; his mother was a weaver from Nitshill who came to Pollokshaws
to work in the Auldfield Mill, also in Cogan Street. He received his elementary
education at Pollok Academy and, as a young man, obtained a degree from Glasgow
University and became a teacher in Lorne Street School, Govan. He was already
taking an active interest in politics, and in 1903 he joined the Social Democratic
Federation, a revolutionary organisation of which he formed a branch in Pollokshaws,
holding weekly meetings at the Shaw Brig or in Towns house Square. But his political
activities and uncompromising attitude brought him into conflict with Govan School
Board and eventually he was dismissed. Paradoxically the Eastwood School Board
allowed him to teach Marxist economics at an evening class in Sir John Maxwell
School and paid him for doing so. In the mid 1900s he lived with his mother at
The West, in a room-and-kitchen in a small building of four dwellings called
Low Cartcraigs that stood on the south side of Cowglen Road east of the railway
bridge. In 1907 he brought the young destitute Russian
refugee Peter Petroff to Pollokshaws, who lived with the McLean's for a time.
He opposed the 1914/18 war that he regarded as being inspired by capitalistic
interests, and championed the cause of industrial workers and approved of the
Russian Revolution in 1917. His speeches on these matters were regarded as seditious
and he was arrested and imprisoned 
in
1916, 1918 and twice in 1922. In 1917 along with the Russian Revolutionary
Leaders Lenin and Trotsky and three others, he was appointed honorary president
of the first all Russian Congress if the Soviets. Later he was appointed
Russian Consul in Glasgow, but this was only a gesture as at that time there
was no diplomatic relations between Russia and Britain. James McDougall,
son of the last-but-one Provost of Pollokshaws who served from 1905 to 1911,
was one of McLean's main supporters. John McLean died, aged 44, at his home
at 42 Auldhouse Road on the 30th of November 1923. On the day of his funeral
thousands of Clydeside workers gathered outside the house in tribute to his
memory and, led by the Clyde Works Band (Ironworks?), marched to Eastwood
Cemetery. Each year after this, on the first Sunday in December, there was
a silent march from Eglinton Toll to the cemetery in which, for a few years,
some thousands took part. But as time passed the numbers decreased until
in 1947 only around fifty attended, and thereafter the march was discontinued.
On the 2nd of December 1973 a granite commemorative cairn was unveiled by
McLean's two daughters on the site of the old Towns House in Pollokshaws,
with the Provosts of Glasgow and Edinburgh, and others, in attendance. The
inscription on the cairn describes John McLean with the words FAMOUS PIONEER
OF WORKING CLASS EDUCATION. HE FORGED THE SCOTTISH LINK IN THE GOLDEN CHAIN
OF WORLD SOCIALISM. It has been explained in a biography that the words 'working
class education' does not mean orthodox adult education, but 'the schooling
of the masses of workers in the basic principles of Marxism'. it can be assumed
that 'socialism' in this instance is McLean’s conception
of the word and not that of the Labour Party since the 1970s. In 1979 the
Russian Government issued a commemorative postage stamp to mark the centenary
of his birth.
JAMES MAXTON
Was born in
Pollokshaws in 1885, where his father was headmaster of Pollok Academy. Maxton
junior obtained a degree at Glasgow University and became a teacher. His political
views were similar to John McLean's, and for a time they worked together for
their cause in Pollokshaws, but apparently with little local support. Like McLean,
Maxton's political activities in Glasgow brought him a term of imprisonment in
1916, but the friendship endured until McLean's death in 1923 when Maxton was
a pallbearer at the funeral. But they followed different political paths with
McLean becoming a Marxist, while Maxton followed left wing socialism by joining
the Independent Labour Party (ILP) in 1904, the members of which gained notoriety
during the 1920s as the Red Clydesiders. As his party's candidate Maxton became
Member of Parliament for Bridgeton, Glasgow, in 1922 and continued to represent
the constituency until his death in 1946, having served as Party Chairman for
two five year periods. He was a popular figure in the House of Commons and was
noted
for his oratory, and but for the loyalty to his small Party he might have held
office in a Labour Government. He wrote two books on political subjects and an
autobiography, and has been considered to be of sufficient importance to merit
an entry in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
YOUR OTHER NATIONAL DRINK! 
In 1830 Mr Robert Barr of Falkirk started a cork
cutting business servicing the local trade. This
venture flourished for a while until the innovation
of more modern bottle closures caused a decline in the need of cork.
This prompted his son, also named Robert, to set himself up as an "aerated
water manufacturer" in Falkirk
in 1875, supplying to a local population of 40,000. Twelve years
later, in 1887, his son Robert Fulton Barr, started a soft drinks'
business on his own account in Parkhead, Glasgow. Although the Glasgow
base was an offshoot of the Falkirk establishment, it had a much
larger population (approaching 1,000,000) to 
supply. It was this
business that was subsequently taken over by brother
Andrew G. Barr, who gave his name to the present company.
His son, William S. Barr, chairman 1909-1031, who spent some of his
life living in the Pollokshaws area, was heavily into product advertising
and had always laid emphasis on fitness and strength. He was also
a devotee of strong man George Sandow's body building techniques,
and was capable of tearing a telephone directory apart. Local athletes
were enlisted to extol the "brew's" virtues - Willie Lyon, Celtic
- "Best
restorative for any athlete" - John Blair, Motherwell - "The tonic
properties are just what every athlete requires" and later the great
Benny Lynch added his endorsement.
BOBBY EVANS
Another son of "The Shaws" played defensively for both Glasgow
Celtic and Scotland. Never a goal scorer he received 48 international
caps from the 23rd October 1948, playing against Wales to the 8th June1960,
against Turkey.
From the 6th of May 1959 he skippered the team to a
3-2 victory over the then West Germany carrying on as captain until
the end of his international career.
He played along with such greats
as Willie Ormond, Tommy Docherty, George Young, Bertie Auld, Ian St.
John and Denis Law.
ALEX NORTON
Another "Shaws" boy, probably best known for his current
role as DCI Matt Burke in the long running Glasgow based detective
series "Taggart".
Alex has had a long and distinguished career that has seen him in
Dr. Finlay’s Casebook at the tender age of fourteen to roles
in other hit shows such as Blackadder, The Bill, Bergerac, Juliet Bravo
and The Sweeny, which found him up against another TV Cop legend, John
Thaw. Then there are his roles in UK based films such as Bill Forsyth’s
Gregory’s Girl, Little Voice where he worked with the likes of
Michael Caine and Ewan McGregor and blockbuster movies such as Braveheart
which found him working alongside Mel Gibson and Brian Cox, Local Hero
set in the north of Scotand where he worked alongside Burt Lancaster,
Denis Lawson and Jenny Seagrove. The Patriot Games as Dennis Cooley
working with Harrison Ford, James Earl Jones, Sean Bean, Richard Harris
and Samuel L Jackson. Chernobyl: The Final Warning where he played
Dr. Andreyev alongside Jon Voight, Annette Crosbie and Jason Robards
and most recently in The Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s
Chest in which he plays Captain Bellamy alongside Johnny Depp, Orlando
Bloom and Keira Knightley. Interestingly Alex had to turn down a part
in Peter Jackson’s movie King Kong due to clash with other filming
schedules. To find out more about Alex Norton follow the link by clicking
on his picture above.