Journey 8
HV Morton
Glasgow
Where did the shipbuilding industry go?
“The Clyde made Glasgow, and Glasgow made the Clyde,” Morton quotes a wise old Glaswegian telling him.
Nick follows Morton in hiring a boat. What was so special about the river in Morton’s day, and what’s special
about it now?
For over a century before Morton’s visit, many of the world’s biggest ships like Lusitania and HMS Hood had been built on the Clyde. But by the 1920s, a worldwide slump in shipbuilding had gripped the area. The busiest waterfront in Britain collapsed, and 65% of the workers lost their jobs.
Yet while Morton acknowledges the hardship this caused, he prefers to focus on the lost romance of the river. To an extent, politics got in the way of his quaint view.
Shipbuilding did recover, in part, but finally left the Clyde in the 1970s. The area is now regenerating with property development and service industries such as call centres.