WAY Mary stood up for everyone
WE REVISIT DEREK PARKER’S RAMBLES THROUGH RENFREWSHIRE
The Paisley area is justifiably proud of political sons like Willie Gallacher and Jimmy Maxton who campaigned for better living and working conditions for ordinary people.
Less well-known is Elderslie carpetweaver and Red Clydesider Mary ‘Granny’ Barbour who died 50 years ago last month.
Mary stood up to unscrupulous landlords who threatened to impose hefty rent increases on poor families during the First World War – or evict them from their homes – when fathers and husbands were fighting and dying on foreign battlefields. The unprincipled landlords mistakenly thought the women would be too scared to oppose them.
Born in Kilbarchan on February 22, 1875, Mary was the third of seven children parented by carpet weaver James Rough and his wife, Jane Gavin.
After the family moved to Elderslie in 1887, Mary worked as a thread twister, then carpet printer at Stoddard’s Glenpatrick Works, before marrying David Barbour from Johnstone in 1896.
The couple settled in Govan where
Derek Parker knew many of Paisley’s secrets – the grimy and the good.
He wandered every corner in search of the clues that would unlock Renfrewshire’s rich history.
These tales were shared with readers in his hugely popular Parker’s Way column.
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David became an engineer at Fairfield’s shipyard. Mary joined the Independent Labour Party and taught in the Socialist Sunday School.
In 1915, she led active resistance by tenements’ committees to the immoral rent rises. She encouraged non-payment of increases, helped the women to fight evictions and drove out bullying sheriff officers trying to evict tenants from their homes.
Thousands of people converged on Glasgow City Centre on November 17 to support the rent strike.
The campaign was spearheaded by ‘Mrs Barbour’s Army’, as the strikers were affectionately dubbed by Buddie Willie Gallacher – Scotland’s first Communist MP, soon to be honoured by a statue in Paisley High Street.
The subsequent Rent Restrictions Act marked a turning point in Scotland’s housing history and benefited Paisley’s working-class tenement dwellers.
In 1920, Mrs Barbour became Glasgow’s first woman councillor and baillie when she won Fairfield Govan ward for Labour. She supported municipal banks, wash- houses, laundries, baths, child welfare centres, home helps and pensions for mothers.
Retiring from the council in 1931, Mrs Barbour remained active on housing, welfare and co-operative committees.
She arranged seaside outings for poor families.
Granny Barbour died on April 2, 1958, aged 83. Her funeral took place at Craigton Crematorium.
Today there are plans to commemorate her with a monument in Glasgow. She should also be honoured in Renfrewshire where she was born, lived and worked.
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