The literary club that produced this magazine consisted of employees of The Falkirk Iron Company, Ltd. According to company literature, the firm was established in 1815, became a joint stock company in 1819, and only closed in 1981. Some of the records for this company are housed in Falkirk Archives. An overview of its history is available on the Falkirk Community Trust Museum and Archives Collection website. It is currently unknown when exactly the company’s Literary Club was formed.

Castings Magazine was produced quarterly and cost 3d. Following four pages of advertisements for local businesses, the table of contents lists 18 contributions. The entire work is a total of only 28 pages. This miscellany includes a variety of non-fiction articles, for example: on George Borrow’s book, Lavengro; the League of Nations; a trip from Shanghai to Hankow; instructions on ‘How to construct a cheap Receiving Set’; and one which asks ‘Who was William Shakespeare?’.

Original poetry is also included along with a feature called ‘Vanities in Verse’, which contains short, light-hearted poems on the lark, on wishes, on memory, as well as a nursery rhyme. In addition to a ‘Ladies [sic] Page’ that lists various recipes, other features include ‘Works and Welfare News’, and news on the Boys’ Welfare Club and the Girls’ Welfare Club. There are reports on the company sports teams, the company prize winners at the Falkirk Cattle Show and on the Benevolent Funds Committee.

Interestingly, there are also two employee biographies. The first is on James Kidston, a dresser at Falkirk Iron works, who started work for the company on 24 March 1863, and was still in same department in 1923. Kidston wrote prose pieces, and one of his poems (about being kind and patient) is given at end of the piece. The second biography is on John Hastings, who started working for the company at age 10 on 5 June 1860 and retired in 1922. He started in the Grate Fitting Shop, eventually became a Shop Foreman, before finally working in the Hollow-ware Department, having charge of the Tin Cover Shop.

Of note is that there is a writing competition offered in this issue, with prize money for the best two articles and photographs (10/ for each) submitted for the issue. The competition subject was to be ‘Holiday Experience’.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Literary Club of The Falkirk Iron Company, Ltd.

Date of Existence

1923?-?

Date of Magazine

June 1923 (No. 2)

Number of Issues

1 (extant) (at least 2 produced)

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Published

Contents and Contributions

Advertisements; Art/Illustrations; Letters to Editor; Photographs (company employees); Photographs (company sports teams); Poems (original); Reports; Table of Contents; Title page

Repository

Falkirk Archives, Callendar House

Reference

The records for the Saltcoats Literary and Debating Society are housed in Ayrshire Archives Headquarters, Ayr. They include the minutes from 1897 until 1982, along with lists of members, syllabi, cash books, correspondence and newspaper articles for various years. A full study of this society remains to be conducted. The one extant issue of the magazine that this group produced is housed in Irvine Townhouse.

The table of contents lists 22 contributions to this magazine, including the ‘Introduction’ and ‘Answers to Correspondents’, and is a total of 80 pages. The authors’ names — presumably all male — are given, which is not very common for either manuscript or published literary society magazines.

According to the ‘Introduction’, the group met on a weekly basis, and its ‘primary object’ was ‘the acquiring of knowledge by mutual effort’. The purpose of the published magazine was prompted by the wish of ‘putting into more permanent form some of the work overtaken by the Society during the winter session’ (‘Introduction’,  Saltcoats Literary Society Magazine, Session 1904-05 (Saltcoats: Archibald Wallace, 1905), p. 3).  While the articles are admittedly of a more serious tone — ‘It undoubtedly lacks much of the humorous element common to popular magazines’ — it reflects the tone and seriousness of the members’ collective endeavours.

The introduction asks readers to remember that the magazine is a production of amateurs, and makes no claim for absolute originality. Almost all of the articles were first read aloud at the society meetings, and they appear in the magazine in condensed form so as to limit costs as well as the readers’ patience. The magazine’s intended audience was to include not only society members but also the public.

In addition to advertisements for local businesses that appear at the front and back, the issue contains a mixture of non-fiction articles, original fiction and poetry. Outwith those that accompany the advertisements, there are no illustrations for any of the contributions.

The ‘Answers to Correspondents’ is the final contribution in which the Editor replies to letters singly and collectively, as in the case of ‘J. M. and Others’: ‘We were very much surprised at the amount of poetry received for this Magazine. We had room for a very few of the more suitable ones’ (Editor, ‘Answers to Correspondents’, Saltcoats Literary Magazine, p. 79). In addition to providing feedback on the contributions, there are also answers to factual questions posed, often with a humorous twist. For example, the answer to ‘K”s question was as follows: ‘Saltcoats is 30 miles from Glasgow and 390 from London. We are unable to compute its distance from Ardrossan. Judging from the remarks of some people we know it must be a long way off indeed’ (Ibid). (Ardrossan is just under 2 miles from Saltcoats: there appears to have been a rivalry between the two towns during this period.)

To date, it is unknown if any further issues of this magazine were produced.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Saltcoats Literary and Debating Society

Date of Existence

1891-1982?

Date of Magazine

1905 (Session 1904-05)

Number of Issues

1

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Published (Saltcoats: Archibald Wallace, 1905)

Contents and Contributions

Advertisements; Articles (non-fiction); Correspondence column; Essays; Fiction/Narrative; Poems (original); Table of Contents; Title page

Repository

Irvine Townhouse, North Ayrshire

Reference

Overview

According to the opening article in the first issue of this magazine, the Abbey Foregate Congregational Church Literary Society was founded in 1893. Meetings were held weekly, and it was quite a large society of predominantly young men and women: it was reported that between two and three hundred people often attended, and the number grew to three or four hundred by 1897.

It was three years before they decided to start their own magazine. The first issue was put into print in March 1896 and cost 2d. The second issue appeared over a year later in April 1897, and the cost went up to 3d. It seems that production costs were covered by both the subscriptions and the advertisements for local businesses that are included at the front and back of both issues. Each issue is 18 pages in length.

This miscellany contains a mixture of various non-fiction articles, a few fictional stories, a number of reports on past society meetings and several original photographs that accompany the articles.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Abbey Foregate Congregational Church Literary Society (Shrewsbury)

Date of Existence

1896?-1897?

Date of Magazine

March 1896 and April 1897

Number of Issues

2

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Print (Shrewsbury: W. G. Napier, Printer, 1896); (Shrewsbury: W. G. Napier, Printer, 1897)

Contents and Contributions

Advertisements; Articles (non-fiction); Fiction/Narratives; Photographs; Poems (original); Poem (republished material); Reports; Table of Contents; Title pages

Repository

Shropshire Archives (Shrewsbury)

Reference

NO4212/7/1/1-2

Overview

A summary of the history of the Barony Mutual Improvement Society is available on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds (see ‘Additional Notes’ below).

The society was formed in 1863 by young men from the congregation of the Barony Church (Church of Scotland), which was built in 1799 and located near the Glasgow Cathedral. The group later changed its name to the Barony Young Men’s Association.

This society produced manuscript magazines by and for their members between 1863 and 1875. There are six volumes housed in the University of Strathclyde Archives (GB 249 T-MIN/18/1/1-6): July 1863; August 1863; September 1863; August 1864; March 1869; and 1873-1875. The earliest magazine that we have, the July 1863 volume, is actually the third that they issued.

The August 1863 issue of the Barony M.S. Magazine is fairly typical of mutual improvement society magazines, which are almost always miscellanies, containing a mixture of prose and poetry, fiction and non-fiction pieces on various topics, along with original artwork and even music. A unique feature of this genre is the readers’ ‘Criticisms’: readers would write their comments about the articles into the back of the magazine after they were done reading it. This society was unusual, however, in that they had a very active critical community of readers. The August 1863 issue, for example (a digitised copy of which is available, see below), contains a remarkable 25 pages of criticisms.

Their August 1863 issue has been digitised courtesy of the University of Strathclyde Archives and is available on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Barony Mutual Improvement Society (later became the Barony Young Men’s Association) (Glasgow)

Date of Existence

1863-1875?

Date of Magazine

1863-1875

Number of Issues

6

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Manuscript

Contents and Contributions

Advertisements; Art/Illustrations (original); Articles (non-fiction); Club notices; Editorials; Essays; Fiction/Narratives; Poems (original); Readers’ Criticisms; Serial articles/stories; Tables of Contents; Title pages

Repository

University of Strathclyde Archives

Reference

GB 249 T-MIN/18/1

Additional Notes

See also entry for Barony Mutual Improvement Society on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds.

This is not the same as the Barony Free Church Literary Society. For more information about this society, see entry for Barony Free Church Literary Society on Glasgow’s Literary Bonds website.

From the University of Strathclyde Archives online catalogue:

‘Scope and content
Manuscript magazines issued under the auspices of the Barony Mutual Improvement Society, later the Barony Young Men’s Association. Subjects include religion, local history, natural history, travel, natural philosophy, mechanics. The editors were Thomas Martin, Archibald Campbell, John Goldie, Edward Railton Catterns, George Smeaton Rodger, W. Ferrie Anderson and James Meek. The contributions were bound on the premises of Robert Nelson, Princes Court, Buchanan Street. All volumes carry the bookplate of the Barony Association’s Library’ [accessed 21 January 2018].

Overview

A summary of the history of the Glasgow Foundry Boys’ Religious Society, Wellington Palace Branch is available on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds (see ‘Additional Notes’ below).

This magazine is printed in double columns and laid out in newspaper format. It is written in the same hand throughout. It was produced by a large Christian workers’ association and articles have a strong focus on Christian self-improvement, education, temperance and morality for the young (see below). The magazine is anomalous as although it is a society magazine, it was part of a much larger enterprise and is not clearly part of a collective or shared initiative. A cost of one half-penny is listed and the magazine includes paid advertisements, suggesting that it was in part a commercial enterprise.

There were only twelve (lithographed?) issues of this monthly magazine ever produced, and these are bound together in one hardcover volume. The, apparently, enthusiastic members of the Wellington Branch of the Foundry Boys’ Religious Society started the periodical as they felt ‘the want of some proper medium for the expression by the Workers of the numberless suggestions and hints that spring up within them and clamour for utterance’, suggestions which were not being brought properly to attention at the Council meetings held by the larger parent organisation (‘Introductory’, The Foundry Boy, No. 1, January 1886, p. 1).

The magazine was non-sectarian, being aimed more broadly at Christian readers, and it reported on the various aspects of the branch’s work, along with the meetings, activities and events held in local branches across Glasgow, which, presumably, did not have their own magazines. Each issue is eight pages and cost one halfpenny, but by July 1886, this was increased to one penny. Contributions are almost entirely anonymous but a few are signed with the author’s name (usually a minister) or a pen-name.

Copies were available either by post or at the Christian Institute and at various local booksellers. (For more information about the Christian Institute, see ‘Christian Institute‘ on The Glasgow Story website.) In addition, issues could be had at selected booksellers in Paisley, Greenock, Kilmarnock, Rothesay, Coatbridge, Edinburgh and Dundee (‘The Foundry Boy’, ‘To Subscribers’, The Foundry Boy, No. 7, July 1886, p. 3). Presumably, the subscriptions did not cover the costs of production, as advertisements can be found amongst the articles and particularly on the last two pages of each issue.

The final issue of the magazine appeared in December 1886, when the Editor/s announced its discontinuation for reasons that are left ambiguous.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Glasgow Foundry Boys’ Religious Society, Wellington Palace Branch

Date of Existence

1867-1914?

Date of Magazine

Jan. 1886-Dec. 1886

Number of Issues

12

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Print (lithograph?)

Contents and Contributions

Address; Advertisements; Art/Illustrations (original); Articles (non-fiction); Attendance records (totals); Bible lessons; Branch statistics; Correspondence columns; Directories; Editorials; Essays; Hymn; Letters to Editor; Miscellaneous (announcements); News (local branches of society); Poems (original); Reports; Serial articles/stories; Sketches

Repository

Mitchell Library Special Collections

Reference

Mitchell (GC) 206 98783

Additional Information

See also entry for Glasgow Foundry Boys’ Religious Society, Wellington Palace Branch on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds.

A summary of the history of the Renwick Free Church Literary Association is available on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds (see ‘Additional Notes’ below).

At the first formative meeting of this group in October 1889, a proposal was made to have a manuscript magazine for the society, which was ‘favorably mentioned by several of the gentlemen present’. An Editor was duly appointed as one of the office bearers. It is of note that this society saw the production of a magazine as an important element to the aims of the group from the very beginning.

The group’s magazine would take the form of a ‘Magazine Night’, and a decision was made later on to have the contributions bound. ‘Magazine Evenings’ or ‘Magazine Nights’ were meetings that were devoted to the reading of original essays (or occasionally poems) written by group members that were submitted to the Magazine Editor beforehand. The Editor would be responsible for collecting, occasionally selecting, and reading the pieces aloud to the group (more rarely this was done by the contributor him/herself) on the appointed night. This would be followed by ‘criticism’ — or discussion on the piece’s positive and negative points — by the group members.

After the meetings, these contributions were sometimes bound and saved in the society’s library (if they had one) or would be kept by one of the office bearers. In these cases, it was intended that the magazine was to be preserved and that group members would have access to it at a later date. It is of note that literary and mutual improvement groups used the term ‘magazine’ to refer to the oral as well as the material medium.

The association’s first Magazine Night was held on 15 February 1890, when the Editor, James McGilvery, read aloud the pieces that were sent to him prior to the meeting. The minutes note that McGilvery took the trouble of re-writing all the pieces into a single document. This was an uncommon practice in mutual improvement and literary groups. It was usually done to try to maintain the anonymity of the authors as their respective handwriting was presumably recognisable by other group members. This practice also helped to give a uniformity to the magazine, which, for some societies was of some import.

The contributions from that first night were both prose essays and poems. The authors chose pen-names, for example, ‘Abbot’ and ‘Muse’. Most of the titles were not recorded, but it was noted that a paper entitled the ‘Evolution of Plants’ and a clay pipe’s humorous soliloquy drew the most conversation, the substance of which is given. The subjects of the other pieces and the comments they elicited were noted. The first Annual Report for the society described the night a a ‘brilliant success’.

At the close of the meeting, it was proposed that the magazine be bound and made part of the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) Library, and that the literary society members would have have first priority.  The magazine was then placed in the YMCA Library, and was the joint property of the society and the YMCA. To date, we have found no evidence of this volume or the second volume, which was also recorded as being bound.

Thereafter, a Magazine Night was held once a session in February. In some cases, the titles and respective summaries are given in the minutes. In the case of some of the poems, it is not possible to determine the subject.

After the society was revived in 1908, the next Magazine Night was held in December 1909, with last being held a year later.

Name of Club, Society or Group That Produced the Magazine

Renwick Free Church Literary Association (Glasgow)

Date of Existence

9 November 1889-1892; 9 January 1908-1913?

Date of Magazine

February 1890, February 1891, February 1892, December 1909, December 1910

Number of Issues

5 (possibly not extant)

Manuscript/Published Magazine

Manuscript (magazines appear to be no longer extant)

Contents and Contributions

Advertisement; Articles (non-fiction); Correspondence column; Editorial; Essays; Fiction/Narrative; Game (acrostic); Letter to Editor; Poems (original); Sketch

Repository

(Glasgow City Archives)

Reference

(See: Renwick Church of Scotland [from GCA folder: ‘from 1876 Renwick Free Church’], Literary Association, minutes, 1889-1892; 1908-1913)

(Note: these records are listed under different reference numbers in the Glasgow City Archives (GCA) black reference binder, and in the National Records of Scotland (NRS) online catalogue. Both are listed here: (GCA folder:) GCA, TD396/30/1-2; (NRS cat.:) GCA, CH3/1650/9/3/1-2)

Additional Notes

See also entry for Renwick Free Church Literary Association on our sister website, Glasgow’s Literary Bonds.