Springburn Virtual Museum

Background

March 2003

When Springburn Community Museum first opened its doors to the general public in 1986, it did so with the primary aim of telling the story of the rise, decline and rebirth of the industrial community of Springburn. Over the years it has done this with the aid of photographs, models and historical artefacts, but above all through the stories and memories of local people.

Staff at the museum have contributed to teaching and research on the social and economic history of Springburn, producing educational resource packs for students and publishing several books on the history of the rail works. Exhibitions on topics such as home life in the tenements and tower blocks, and working life in the locomotive works, have won widespread acclaim. They have welcomed as many as 10,000 visitors to the museum each year and dealt with requests for information from local residents, Springburn emigrants and their descendents, students, researchers, railway enthusiasts and others.

During the summer of 2000 it became apparent that the future of Springburn Community Museum was under immediate threat. A race began to ensure that important elements of the museum's rich collection of local photographs would still be accessible to the wider public.

The Glasgow Digital Library was able to secure a small amount of funding from SCRAN to digitise a representative selection of materials from the collection of Springburn Community Museum and thereby lay the foundations for Springburn Virtual Museum.

Images from the collection have been chosen to convey important elements of the social and economic history of Springburn. Particular emphasis has been placed upon the railway industry and community and tenement life in Springburn. Some of the selected images are very detailed and are presented at various resolutions to draw out the richness of the information within them.

Also included is a page of links to other websites that deal with related aspects of Springburn and the railway industry in Scotland. For those who wish to further investigate the history of Springburn and the railway industry in Glasgow, a selected bibliography of key publications is provided.

The Glasgow Digital Library was able to secure a small amount of funding from SCRAN to digitise a representative selection of materials from the collection of Springburn Community Museum and thereby lay the foundations for Springburn Virtual Museum.

On Friday 30 March 2001, Springburn Community Museum closed its doors for the last time, unable to secure sufficient funding to pay for staff costs, essential building repairs and the upkeep of the collection. The collection, built up over many years and numbering well in excess of 15,000 items, has been split up and will now be housed in several different collections across the city of Glasgow.