Over mid-September, Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival 2024 celebrated the city’s rich history with a week-long program of events, including tours of over 100 buildings, guided walks, workshops, trails and talks—all free to the public. Now in its 35th year, the festival has been organised by the Glasgow Building Preservation Trust (GBPT) since its inception in 1990. This year’s theme, “We’re All Here: Diversity & Diaspora,” explored how migration has shaped the city and featured contributions from and collaborations with a range of organisations, from Migrant Voice to Springburn Unity Network.
A particularly poignant aspect of this year’s festival was a focus on Glasgow’s “lost children,” who were sent to Canada as part of a child migration program in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Over 100,000 children were sent from the UK between 1869 and 1939, 7,000 of whom came from Glasgow, many through William Quarrier’s Children’s Homes. While some found loving families, others faced separation from siblings and endured abuse. These stories are deeply embedded in the Canadian population, with an estimated 11% of Canadians descended from these child migrants.
As part of the festival, a collaboration between Glasgow Building Preservation Trust, the Scottish Council on Archives and social care charity IRISS explored this history through two webinars. The first, “Give Us The Power To Make A Golden Bridge Across The Atlantic,” reunited members of the original Golden Bridge team to discuss their work on curating the story of Glasgow’s child migrants, first exhibited at the Heatherbank Museum of Social Work in 2001 and later digitized by social care charity, IRISS. The second webinar featured experts such as Dr. Irene O’Brien from the Mitchell Archives, genealogist Tahitia McCabe from the University of Strathclyde, and Nicole Watier from Library and Archives Canada. This event offered practical advice for those researching their family history, highlighting the challenges of accessing sensitive archival documents related to child migrants.
These events honoured the memory of Glasgow’s child migrants and offered attendees a meaningful connection to the city’s complex history of migration. Both webinars were recorded and are available on YouTube (links below). GBPT are hoping to continue working with SCA and IRISS to further raise awareness of the Home Children story over the next year.
Links:
- The Golden Bridge website: https://content.iriss.org.uk/goldenbridge/
- Webinar 1: ‘Give Us The Power To Make A Golden Bridge Across The Atlantic’ – Honouring Glasgow’s child migrants: https://youtu.be/lXBMY6PGRJc
- Webinar 2 ‘The Power of Archives Finding the Home Children who went to Canada’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewiwTrS7l4Q
- SCA webpage on Home Children: https://www.scottisharchives.org.uk/explore/ancestral-tourism/home-children/
Featured image:
Boys’ migration group 7th May 1885 accompanied by Mr Halliwell, Mr Mackie, who was going to settle in Canada, and Mary Quarrier, William Quarrier’s youngest daughter. From the Golden Bridge website, © 2007 Quarriers
