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Glasgow Live
Glasgow Live
National
David McLean

Incredible photos show Glasgow's lost St Enoch Station and Hotel in 1970s before they vanished for good

A series of never-before-seen photographs showing the final days of St Enoch Station have appeared online.

Dozens of colour snaps of the lost landmark, taken in July 1975, were shared on the Lost Glasgow page on Facebook and have proved a big hit.

They show then a derelict station, that closed to rail traffic in 1966 and was eventually replaced by the St Enoch Centre, being used as a car park.

READ MORE: Glasgow video reveals remains of forgotten station at the top of Buchanan Street

Exterior shots feature surrounding streets and the once bustling railway station's grand hotel.

Built in 1876, the vast St Enoch terminal was one of Glasgow's four mainline railway stations that existed prior to the infamous Beeching Cuts of the 1960s.

The accompanying St Enoch Station Hotel, which was the first in the city to be fitted out with electric lighting, rose several storeys above St Enoch Square.

Both the railway terminal and the hotel were demolished in 1977 - much to the horror of many locals.

The 1975 images were taken by budding photographer Enid Reid, who, as a photography and interior design student in Glasgow, loved to capture contemporary scenes around the city.

Enid, who now runs a successful florist, Enid Reid Flowers, in Battlefield, says she was particularly fond of the area around St Enoch Square, as it was where her father had an office in the 1960s.

She told Glasgow Live that it's a shame the St Enoch Station - particularly the hotel - is no longer with us.

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Enid said: "I knew St Enoch Square very well as my father had an office there with a wee balcony that looked over to the station when I was young.

"I thought it was terrible when the buildings were demolished. It had been such a lively part of town, with wine merchants and all sorts of things."

Enid's photographs offer a fascinating glimpse of the area around St Enoch Square and surrounding streets as they looked in the mid-1970s.

Along with the now vintage cars, signage, and unmistakably-1970s fashions - including flares and platform soles - on display, many of the scenes captured are largely unrecognisable today.

In one image, we can see St Enoch Station's famous clock, which, after the bulldozers moved in, was moved to Cumbernauld town centre and very famously featured in the film Gregory's Girl.

Another features J W Galloway's butcher shop, on the corner of St Enoch Square and Howard Street, with its pun-laden red lettering on the frontage, reading "Meat at Galloway's".

For Enid, the photographs, which have recently been digitised by her son, Rob, evoke strong memories of sights, sounds - and, being a florist, the smells - of the era they were taken.

Enid also says it came as something as a shock to see the St Enoch Hotel being pulled down - and she's no fan of the shopping centre eventually built on the site in 1989.

She said "I remember it all so vividly. There was a vennel at the back of Lewis's department store that had the most incredible smell of exhaust fumes - there was absolutely no ventilation.

"At that time we knew the station was going, but we had assumed they would save the hotel. Sadly at that time, if you gave the developers an inch, they'd take 12.

"I've always hated the St Enoch Centre - it's horrible compared to what we lost. If they had kept the frontage, imagine how fantastic that would've been. What a shame. They did some criminal stuff in the 60s and 70s."

You can view Enid Reid's incredible photos here.

This story was originally published in January 2022.

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