Glasgow Gallivanting: March 2021

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Scottish Event Campus with ambulances

March’s big news is that we got our first Covid jags, a hopeful event which makes us feel that there is finally a way out of the current pandemic. We were called to Glasgow’s central vaccination hub at NHS Louisa Jordan, which in normal times is known as the SEC Centre. It’s the shed-like building shown above, with the domed SSE Hydro and the Clyde Auditorium (more commonly known as the Armadillo because of the shape of the roof) peeking out behind it. Together they comprise the Scottish Event Campus, or SEC.

NHS Louisa Jordan
NHS Louisa Jordan
NHS Louisa Jordan
Ambulances at Louisa Jordan
Ambulances at Louisa Jordan

NHS Louisa Jordan, our equivalent of the Nightingale Hospitals in England, was created in the SEC Centre at the beginning of the pandemic to take the pressure off the rest of the health service in case it became overwhelmed by Covid cases. Fortunately it was never needed in that role, but staff at the hospital have:

  • carried out more than 32,000 outpatient and diagnostic appointments
  • trained over 6,900 healthcare staff and students
  • vaccinated approximately 175,000 people
  • supported the Scottish Blood Transfusion Service with over 500 donations
  • provided Occupational Health services for the University of Glasgow for nearly 1,000 people
Elsie Inglis
Dr Elsie Inglis

Quite an achievement! But who is the woman after whom the hospital was named? Nursing Sister Louisa Jordan was born in Maryhill, Glasgow, in 1878, and joined the Scottish Women’s Hospital (SWH) in December 1914. SWH was set up by Dr Elsie Inglis to tend to the wounded of the First World War. She thought at first that she could get funding from the Scottish Red Cross, but was told by its head, Sir George Beatson, that he could have “nothing to say to a hospital staffed by women.” Instead, the Suffrage movement raised the required money, but still the misogyny continued. When Dr Inglis approached the Royal Army Medical Corps to offer them a ready-made medical unit staffed by qualified women, the War Office told her to “go home and sit still”. It was, instead, the French government which took up her offer and eventually there were 14 nursing teams sent to Belgium, France, Serbia and Russia.

Louisa Jordan
Sister Louisa Jordan

Louisa Jordan was part of the 1st Serbian unit, based in Kraguievac, a city 100 miles south of Belgrade. She did not last long there. In February typhus broke out, and Louisa, who had experience of working in a fever hospital, was put in charge of the typhus ward. Unfortunately, she caught the disease herself and died on 6 March 1915. Elsie Inglis did not survive the War either, dying of cancer in November 1917. She too was commemorated by a hospital, the Elsie Inglis Memorial Maternity Hospital in Edinburgh which operated from 1925 until 1988.

As regular readers know, I am always keen to find memorials to women, especially lesser known heroines. There was a certain amount of political controversy when the Scottish Government named the hospital after Louisa Jordan rather than Florence Nightingale, but I think it is only right to choose a local nurse. The latter is famous, but few had heard of Louisa – I hadn’t, despite being familiar with the story of Elsie Inglis and SWH. I’m glad that her place in history is now acknowledged.

And now for some lighter matters. In January, I featured some of Louise McVey’s graffiti ceramics. I haven’t spotted any more, but I found one rather nice example that I had inadvertently missed out, and one that has been updated. The formerly golden heart on Cleveden Drive is now pink and says “Broke” across it. Judging by the messy way it has been done, I suspect it was not by the original artist. Was it some lovelorn person expressing his or her feelings? If so, I wish s/he hadn’t, but I suppose that’s the nature of public art.

Sydenham Lane
Cleveden Drive
Cleveden Drive

I thought we had discovered all the Covid art around the West End over the past year, but by walking round the back of Hayburn Park one evening, instead of round the front, we discovered a little gallery on the railings. Below are my favourites – I particularly identify with the lockdown locks! Hair salons are not yet open here…

Anti-vax
Superspreader
COVID dictionary
Lockdown locks

Bell’s Bridge has also acquired some new graffiti art, some of it Covid related.

Bell’s Bridge graffiti art
Bell’s Bridge graffiti art

More attractive were two window art events that we explored in nearby neighbourhoods. First, Kelvindale’s Window Wonderland:

Kelvindale Window Wonderland
Kelvindale Window Wonderland

Queen Margaret Drive also held a Window Wonderland as part of its Spring Fling, but unfortunately the nights in question were very wet and we didn’t venture out to see decorated house windows lit up. We appreciated some of the shop windows earlier in the week though.

Ae Fond Kiss window
Atlas window
Hidden Dram window
Yarn Cake window
Comet Pieces window
QM Eye window
North Star window
Bad Mum Bakery window
Kelvin Hair window
Opal Moon window

The final piece of street art we discovered this month is a mural of TV cook Nigella Lawson which is tucked away in a railway arch in Partick. It has been there, relatively unnoticed, since 2016, but a Twitter user has recently brought it to the attention of many more people, including Nigella herself. Comedian and actor Ford Kiernan commented: “They try recipes there, that’s what the fire extinguishers are for”, which highlights my feeling that the mural would be better with all the rubbish cleared away and a bit of touching up!

Last, but not least, we celebrated our Ruby Wedding (40th anniversary) on 21st March. Celebrations were not as we would have planned, even this time last year – who knew we would still be in lockdown? – but we enjoyed ourselves anyway. I doubt we have another 40 years ahead, but we are looking forward to whatever comes.

Happy April!

Scotland, UK , , , ,

82 Comments »

  1. Canada didn’t have lots of supplies at first. We don’t have any vaccine productions in Canada so we are dependent of other countries agreeing to sell us vaccines which the US has refused so far (though it might change soon as we will get our first shipment of Pfizer coming from the US this week). We are getting our supplies from Europe and a bit from India which has now stopped. At first, the doses were coming in small shipments so in order to get more people inoculated the authorities decided to stretch the intervals and the strategy seems to be working as we have less death though some areas continue to have high rate of contamination. But supplies are increasing right now so the authorities might be able to reduce the intervals. We got our second dose appointment the day we got the first dose but we are hoping they will contact us to move up our appointment to June… We are crossing fingers that we might be able to do our first trip outside the country in the Fall; maybe just go to the US but it will be a start.

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  2. Glad you got your first dose of vaccines. We got ours in late March as well but it will take a while before we get the final shots (My province has decided to stretch the intervals to 4 months so our next appointments is for July 17…) But we do have a sense of maybe seeing a light at the end of the tunnel…

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    • 4 months! That seems too long. Ours is a maximum of 12 weeks but most people seem to get it after 8-10. Ours was in the first half of March so I’m hoping we should get the next one by the end of this month. It certainly does bring a bit of hope.

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  3. Glad to hear you got your first jab in March; I’ll get mine this week. I liked the image representing before and after COVID hair styles. For more than a year, I have been cutting my own hair.

    Jude

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  5. Happy belated anniversary! Getting your jabs sounds like a great present, and I think it’s great that they chose to honour a local nurse over Florence Nightingale, who gets enough attention already. Love all the street art, and can definitely relate to the lockdown hair too, although I hadn’t had my hair cut in almost a year before the first lockdown, so I’ve been due for a cut for a long time. I have scheduled an appointment later this month – I’m a bit apprehensive about it since I haven’t had any jabs yet, but my hair looks so awful that I didn’t want to keep waiting indefinitely (I cringe every time I have to look at it in Zoom meetings). The salon seems pretty safety conscious, so hopefully it will be fine!

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  6. Congratulations on your Ruby anniversary Anabel! I love your historical posts – always learn something new and the story of those brave nurses in the 1st World War era is very moving. I do hope things start to open up in Scotland soon!

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  7. What a lovely, lovely post. As always, I learned something. More than one something, too! Yay for the determined nurses, and like you, I’m glad the hospital was named after local heroines rather than Florence Nightingale. Happy belated anniversary, and keep on sharing this great stuff with us, my friend. And also, thanks for the Happy Easter greeting on my blog. You’re a treasure.

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  8. Brilliant post, I’d not heard of Louisa Jordan even though I’ve come across Elise Inglis. I’m glad their names and sacrifice are coming to light- better late than never? Congratulations on your 40th Anniversary, lovely news.

    Thought of you this week as I’ve been reading about the Great Gorbals Whiskey Flood. My Glasgow geography is terrible so no idea if the site is near you or if any monument or memorial remains, but it’s quite a quirky tale!

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    • And I hadn’t heard of the whisky flood! The Gorbals is on the other side of the Clyde from us, and I know it quite well (I thought) because we have a women’s history walk there. I have just looked it up, and the flood was on Muirhead Street which no longer exists. The Central Mosque is now on the site, so there probably isn’t any memorial. How interesting it is to learn from each other!

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  10. Interesting to learn about the woman after whom the hospital was named. Also, to learn about Sister Louisa Jordan. Like you say, Anabel, heroines and now acknowledged. Lockdown locks is a delicate subject around here. Zero haircuts for my husband for almost 1 1/2 years now. My brother refers to them as “flowing locks.”

    Congratulations on your 40th Anniversary! I wish you and your husband many more happy years.

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  12. Happy anniversary, and sorry you couldn’t celebrate with a holiday, which I’m sure you would have done normally. And good stuff that you’ve had your vaccinations. X

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  13. Happy ruby and happy jag: you’re about 6 years ahead of us on the first and a couple of weeks behind us on the second.

    It’s a shame women were once so discriminated against. While that mostly got rectified, the United States (plus some other countries, from what I hear) has disconcertingly been jettisoning equality of opportunity, and there’s an increasing mania in which institutions purposely choose people for jobs based on irrelevant qualities like race—in spite of the fact that American law prohibits it.

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  14. You are doing well to keep your outdoor motivation up and still find new things of interest in your local area. I’d imagine it helps having two of you

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  15. Happy Ruby Anniversary! I hope you enjoy a nice long walk together. Love the window displays but don’t like the broken heart…I wonder if it was someone who decided to change it up. I. Glad you showcase these 2 nurses who also did so much. I read a couple of comments about Florence Nightingale and now would like to know more about her less than. Stellar endowments.

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  16. I think Florence is overrated or maybe I just get grumpy about all the hype around her when she wasn’t that supportive of other pioneering nurses. So I am delighted Glasgow is celebrated local female pioneers

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  17. Happy 40th wedding anniversary, Anabel and John! That’s another special celebration you will have to make up for later. How nice to have the event on the first day of spring. So, happy spring as well!! :-:

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  18. Happy Anniversary to you both! I enjoy learning about your wonderful women, so thank you for sharing their stories. Not all of them will be famous and it’s great that they are recognised and honoured.

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  20. Happy Anniversary to Anabel and John from, Annabell and John!!

    I have been watching the rollout of the Vaccine in Scotland in the Scot. Govt. webpage and it seems to be quite impressive. Ours have not happened yet. It is expected to happen in the fullness of time. Frontline workers first then who knows?

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  21. Happy anniversary! Glad you’ve gotten a dose. We are vaxxed up here. I’m hoping to go visit family in another month or so.

    Enjoyed the street art, as always.

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  22. Happy Anniversary Anabel and John!!!

    That’s great news about getting your first jags; the UK certainly seems ahead of the ball on the vaccine front.

    I’m so pleased that Louisa Jordan was acknowledged; her story reminds me of our Maud Manning — dying treating soldiers in an epidemic!

    I’d read about Elsie Inglis before (probably on your blog), and have to wonder how many servicemen might have lived or been less maimed if the men in charge hadn’t been so bloody sexist.

    Love the street art, and I’m with you on the “broken” heart. 😦

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  23. Happy Anniversary to you both, Anabel. I love that people’s creativity is shining throughout the world. Les will be receiving his vaccination before me, perhaps in May?. It will help though I am sceptical at how much it will be effective for travelling. Not that I have any plans to do any travelling pandemic or not.

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  25. Happy 40th Wedding Anniversary, Anabel and John.
    And congratulations also on receiving your vaccines.
    I am not expecting to receive my first vaccine until sometime in May.
    Until then, I wait quietly (with a touch of vaccine-envy). 😀

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  26. Is jags a Scottish word then?
    Interesting nursing story, women through history have had a rough deal. I’m glad your nurses have been honoured. Congratulations on the wedding anniversary. We’ll be lucky to reach 25, but we live in hope. We’ll only know how resistant we are to this disease once everything is open again and people are mixing, I think many of us of a certain age are going to be cautious for some time to come.

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  29. Happy anniversary! I’m glad Glasgow found a local woman instead of all those Nightingale ones.

    And as usual, you have plenty of things to brighten us up. Thanks so much for keeping going during all these lockdowns. We have officially ‘eased’ to two households outdoors, socially distanced. I’m not entirely sure what the difference is between all the people I see going round in socially distanced pairs – but maybe they were ‘exercise buddies’.

    I went and celebrated my niece’s sixth birthday on Tuesday regardless – I sang happy birthday to her on her doorstep last year, but we invaded the garden this 🙂

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    • We could have two people in the garden at the time of the anniversary, so we did – it wasn’t very warm but we braved it for a couple of hours! I think the Louisa Jordan / Nightingale fuss was a good example of the Scottish cringe I mentioned a few posts ago. I’m glad to take pride in our local heroines!

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  30. Congratulations to you and John – that’s great … and I’m sure in due course there’ll be a belated 40th, and then each year that follows! These are fun art displays … and I did appreciate learning about Louisa Jordan, as too Elsie Inglis – and their contribution to nursing, WW1 – and so pleased the French took their offer up. Thanks – Hilary

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  32. What a lovely eclectic post this week. So much to read about and absorb. Loved the idea of the spring windows and they do look good. I mentioned the vaccinations above so won’t do so here. Oh! Belated 40th Anniversary congratulations. Hope you will celebrate it with a special meal out – and drinks – when we are all allowed to enter restaurants again. I’m not a fan of eating outdoors – unless it’s a picnic of course, the food gets too cold too quickly, I find.

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    • Thanks Mari, I’m hoping our 41st anniversary will be much easier to celebrate, and you’re right, I’m sure we’ll have a special meal out some time before then. John is heading towards his second lockdown birthday (mine fell in the time we could go into restaurants last year and it looks as though this year will be ok 🤞🏻) so we’ll have more than one thing to celebrate.

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  33. An interesting post about Louisa Jordan and Elsie Inglis, though I think you made a slight typo with the year of Elsie’s death 🙂 Love the shop windows and I agree the Nigella street art needs some tidying.

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      • Me too. I’ve just had my second (first was a doddle and no problems) but this time I developed a very sore arm which prevented me from sleeping for two nights, bad headaches, extreme tiredness and feelings of nausea. My god-daughter turned out to be allergic to something in hers and had to be put on anti-biotics as she got an infection. Still, it’s all better than the virus itself, so we are grateful that we’ve had the jab.

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  35. Belated happy anniversary, Anabel 🤗💕 I do love those windows! I have my reservations about the vaccine and how effective it will be in the long run. While we are locked down or proceeding with caution isn’t a fair indication, is it? We are still a long way from it happening here, but I’m happy to celebrate the ladies who struggled to make life better for us all 🤗💕

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