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Bun & Yill House

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Old Dumbarton Road, Partick.

The Bun & Yuill House Tavern

The Bun & Yuill House Tavern.

The large building with a smoking chimney in the centre of this drawing of 1827 was a tavern known as the “Bun and Yill House” or Bunhouse (yill is an old Scots word for ale). It stood on Old Dumbarton Road on the approach to the River Kelvin.
The Bunhouse was the favourite tavern of a group of Glasgow merchants, bankers and professors. They would walk out to Partick from the city each Saturday to dine on roasted duck, sage and onion and green peas, washed down with locally-brewed ale. Their favourite dish gave the name to the drinking and social club they formed in 1810, the Duck Club of Partick. Their president’s fondness for the fowl gave rise to the verse “The ducks of Partick quake with fear, Crying “Lord preserve us, here’s McTear”.

The Wheat Sheaf Inn

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Old Dumbarton Road, Partick.

Wheaf Sheaf Inn Old Dumbarton Road

Thomas Fairbairn’s painting shows the Wheat Sheaf Inn at the eastern end of Old Dumbarton Road. The inn was popular with Glaswegians who walked from the city along the Anderston Walk to Partick and the banks of the River Kelvin, to take in the scenery and the country air. It was demolished at the end of the 19th century.

D. F. Sunter’s Vaults

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13 Old Wynd, off the Trongate, Glasgow.

Mr Alexander Allan

Mr Alexander Allan. 1893.

In the Old Wynd, off the Trongate, round which centre’s many historical associations and grim stories of a bygone age, there was one of the oldest taverns in Glasgow. At the end of the 1800s it was known as the Waverley Bar, owned by Mr D F Sunter. The date when the Waverley became a licensed house is obscure and uncertain, but there was no doubt whatever that early in the morning of the century it was a popular rendezvous for Glasgow’s old cronies. In the stormy period of the year 1819 and 1820, when the people, groaning under political tyranny, the Waverley was well known and a favourite meeting place of the Rads. It has changed many time since and in 1887 Mr Sunter purchased the property.

The old tavern was full of antiquarian objects, so full that a recess in the wall was crowded with all sorts of interesting and unusual items. There was several old guns, skeletons and skins of extinct animals, one valuable engraving of one of the Lords of Eglinton in his costume of the Ayrshire Yeomanry, so rare that it was the only one known in Glasgow. There was also an interesting relic of Sir Colin Campbell with the memorable speech of the old veteran on bidding a final farewell to the Highland Brigade, the noble brigade that climbed the heights of Alma and won for itself a deathless fame in the military annals of the world.

Mr Sunter was a Paisley man and bred to the trade. Early in his career, he was employed for three years in the Civil Service Stores, London, and there received a training which few men engaged in the trade can claim. Mr Sunter was a wine and spirit Merchant and blended his own whisky, he made the Waverley a prosperous concern. The Old Wynd had a bad reputation, it was a very dark smelly place, it was full of thieves, pick-pockets, prostitutes, gangs of men women and children hung about waiting for an opportunity to commit a crime.

Mr Sunter was a talented artist, and had a very interesting image hanging in his tavern, it represents a policeman thrusting his head in at the door just on the Chap of eleven. His bull’s-eyes flashes on those standing at the bar, and then comes: “It’s eleven o’clock, gentlemen.” Before Mr Sunter took over the tavern, he worked for wine and spirit merchant William Faulds who ran an old howff at the corner of Trongate and Brunswick Street.

It was always disputed what was the oldest pub in Glasgow was, the Institution in King Street or the Waverley in the Old Wynd. The evidence of local antiquarians on the subject was conflicting, but there was no doubt that the tavern in the Old Wynd existed in 1745, the year of dark Culloden, when the vanquished hero of the Stuart race was a fugitive among the northern hills. Mr Alexander Allan the proprietor of the Waverley had title deeds which proved it.

The Waverley tavern still retained many traces of it’s original appearance, despite the necessity of adapting and modernising much of it to the wants of the time. Mr Allan paid a lot of money for this old pub at the end of the 1800s and did not keep it for long as the City Improvement had the Old Wynd swept away around 1901. Alexander Allan was a true Scotsman and formerly owned the Auld Hoose, an old licensed house in Alloa, from there he went to the Ferry Inn, South Alloa and after a few months purchased the Waverley, Old Wynd.

Facts…

License Holders.

1875 James Walter.

1892 D F Sunter.

1899 Alexander Allan.

In the 1840s the New Wynd, Old Wynd and the Back Wynd all had tavern’s in them. The Ayrshire tavern was at no66 New Wynd also Hillcoat’s extensive Bar. At no6 Back Wynd the Crown and Anchor was a popular old Tavern.

Stirling Castle

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90 Old Dumbarton Road, Yorkhill, Glasgow. G3 8PZ. Tel: 01413398132.

Stirling Castle

Stirling Castle. 1991.

This was originally Galbraith’s Store the grocers. It opened as a public house during the 1950s.

William Lyall Henderson was then licensee, he ran a small pub in Guest Street, Anderston before taking this pub on.

Situated at the corner of Old Dumbarton Road and Regent Moray Street this popular bar is handy for visitors going to the Glasgow Art Galleries and Museum.

In 1963 David Main took over this pub, in the 1990s Andrew Main was running this successful family business.

Stirling Castle 2007

The Stirling Castle. 2007.

Also see the Stirling Castle Darts Team 1965.

In the NEWS 1976…

Stirling Castle Bar with monkey 1976

You can’t make a monkey out of four-year-old Anthony, one of Dash’s Chimps from the Kelvin Hall Circus, Glasgow. Anthony was perfectly willing to man the pumps when he went along to the Stirling Castle Bar where £160 had been raised for Ward 6 at Philipshill Hospital in a raffle. The trained chimp helped make the draw, then became a counter attraction on his own-bar-none!

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In the NEWS 1979…

Here’s to the Special Blend That Makes A Perfect Pub…

David Main mine host of the Stirling Castle and the Overflow. 1979

At your service…David Main mine host of the Stirling Castle and The Overflow. 1979.

How David Struck GOLD under a tenement…

David Main drives a blue Rolls-Royce, DM 55, with the satisfied air of a man who paid £10,000 for a squalid little drinking den 16 years ago and turned it into a gold-plated tavern.

An instinctive publican, with the shrewd eyes of an accountant, he formed an idea then alien to Glasgow drinkers that pubs should be more than stand drink and fall howfs.

His idea became the Stirling Castle, corner-wedged under tenement at the back of the Kelvin Hall, a potpourri of fine food, rich carpets, warmth, real ale, and groomed staff picked for eagle-eyed attention.

Surveying his creation, David admitted: “A good pub is summed up in a four-letter word… work, and a little imagination. But I must be honest. Sixteen years ago I never thought it had that much potential.

All we wanted to do was make it a better pub than it was. “We started with pie and peas, but soon we gradually expanded. I just felt that comfort and food were becoming more and more important as drinking habits changed.

“It’s not enough to have a bar any more you’ve got to have something else, an image, carpet on the floor, food, music, something different. The spit and sawdust has gone, the new laws helped all that, and people are travelling more, seeing different ways of drinking.

The hard drinker will never change, he’ll just drink, but the rest are changing, have changed.” David Main, now 55, went into the pub business because he couldn’t stand and carpets to people on hire-purchase.

He had a dream of cash over the counter, instant service for instant cash, a pub was the only business. Eighteen months ago, in a move the trade said was insane, he bought and re-vamped the pub across the road. He wryly christened his new baby “The Overflow,” and reproduced a composite English Pub. A 1970s version of London’s turn of the century ill met by gaslight inns.

DIFFERENT

“Everyone thought we were mad to go into competition with ourselves,” laughed David. “But I’m not that daft. We had to create something entirely different to the Stirling Castle, a different look different food. So we went for the English idea.

Salads, ploughman’s lunches, salamis, open sandwiches, again we went for food, that’s our mark. We get a lot of students in here now, a younger, different clientele to the Stirling Castle and it’s gone through the roof, it’s amazing.”

Across the road, a mixed pin-striped suited bag of lawyers, doctors, architects spill in and out of the lounges and the public bar. Thousands of pounds have been raised for charity in the public bar. Added David: “Just before Christmas we had a quick collection and we gave every old-age pensioner living round here, not customers only, a half-bottle of whisky, a tin of biscuits, and a £5 meat voucher for the butcher’s. That’s what it’s about.

“The customers has to be all-important, whether you feel like it or not you have to say “Yes, sir,’ ‘no, sir,’ three bags full, sir. And after them come a good staff, they make the pub. They back you up all you back them up.

“A good publican needs to mix, make friends with the customers, make them feel welcome. I love that, love doing the mine host bit.”

Grabbing menus listing everything from mussels to T-bone steaks show his food standards. David whirls round: “See you’ve got to give things back to the customers. This business has given us everything we’ve got.

“We’ve worked hard for it, but it’s certainly given me, especially in recent years, a much better standard of living and the chance now not to work as hard as I did.”

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Stirling Castle interior 1979

Stirling Castle Darts team 1965, Joe Hitchcock, W Bruce, H Cochrane and David Main.

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David Main owner of the Overflow 1979

The “Semi-Retirement” of Mr. David Main (right), of the Stirling Castle and Overflow bars in Glasgow, was marked by the presentation to him of a pewter Guinness goblet, engraved with David’s own signature under that was Guinness. Presenting the goblet is Mr. Jack Bailie (left), area manager for Guinness in the West of Scotland. In centre is Mr. Andrew Main.

Quinn’s Tavern

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106 Oxford Street, Glasgow. S.S.

Quinn's Tavern, 106 Oxford Street image

Quinn’s Tavern, 106 Oxford Street. Thanks to Norrie McNamee for the image.

Oxford Street is not the longest Street by far, but it has had seven Public Houses to choose from. In the entire history of this pub only seven families ran this pub.

The first licensee was Wine & Spirit Merchant Mr William Russell who acquired a certificate in 1879. William lived at 102 South Portland Street with his family.

Alexander Imrie was the next licensee, he occupied the premises until 1894.

The first lady to hold the licence was Mrs J Neilson. Mrs Neilson lived in an exclusive address at 7 Abbotsford Place in 1896.

Robert Graham was another well known publican to hold the certificate. Mr Graham paid an annual rent of £60 and was granted a licence on 13/04/1898.

Robert Graham gave up the pub at the start of the First World War. This is when George Quinn acquired the licence in 1915. George too was living at a well to do address at 40 Abbotsford Place.

The Quinn family continued to serve the locals here until the 1970s. Other members of the Quinn family included, Daniel McKillop Quinn, Daniel also had the The Royal Oak Bar, 248 Nitshill Road. Daniel Duffy, James Quinn and Mary Agnes Quinn.

Can you remember any of the pubs on Oxford Street, if so please get in touch, or do you remember any other pub names in the area.

 

 

The Quarter Gill

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42 Oswald Street, Glasgow.

Quarter Gill

Quarter Gill. 1991.

There has been a pub on this site since 1870, spirit dealer James Tennent lived just around the corner in Ann Street. Two years later the pub was owned by Thomas Kirkham , the name above the door was Kirkham’s Bar with wine & spirits at each side of his name.

Thomas Kirkham was born in England in 1830 at an early age he joint the forces and fought in the Indian Mutiny. He met his wife Margaret in Barbados, West Indies. They had 8 children Matthew the eldest was born in Tyzebad, Thomas and Jessie were both born in Sutapore and Mary Jane was born in Kussarolie, East Indies. When they settled in Glasgow they had another four children Margaret, Annie, James and Arthur.

Thomas took over the pub in Oswald Street in 1872 trading here until his death in 1917, he was then residing in Kent Avenue, Jordanhill. His son Thomas George Kirkham then took over as trustee, he had the most experience in the licensed trade as he ran 2 pubs of his own in Ingram Street and West Campbell Street. When his father died he left no estate except £1000 and his pub which was quite a lot of money in those days, his two unmarried daughters were solely dependent upon the business.

Thomas jun later disposed of the pubs in West campbell Street and Ingram Street and took over another in Paisley Road at the corner of Pollok Street. He continued to hold the licence for Oswald Street until 1939.

Licence Holders.
1991 William Hurt.
1978-1965 Henry Clayton Shacklady.
1960-1940 Kenneth McKenzie.
1939-1917 Thomas George Kirkham as trustee.
1917-1872 Thomas Kirkham