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A REPUTATION FOR EXCELLENCE
A History of the Glasgow Printing Industry
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Part Three - Expansion
Both the Foulis brothers and Urie were greatly aided in their efforts
to raise the standard of Glasgow printing by the establishment of
the letter-foundry of Alexander Wilson and John Baine at Camlachie
in 1744. The partnership had begun in St Andrews in 1742, but they
moved west in the hope of extending their sales to Ireland and North
America. In 1747 Baine went to Ireland to supervise their interest
there and two years later the partnership was dissolved by mutual
consent. Wilson continued alone, with considerable success, and
supplied the Foulis brothers, among others, with some of their finest
type. In 1760 Wilson was honoured with the appointment of the Practical
Astronomy Professorship in the University of Glasgow and, about
two years later, his type-foundry was moved to the grounds of the
University. The first known specimen from the ‘Glasgow Letter-foundry’,
as it was called, was published in 1772. It consists of twenty-four
octavo leaves and shows only roman and italic in sizes from five-line
to pearl. Alexander Wilson died in 1786 and was succeeded by his
son Andrew. A local supply of good quality printing paper was also
important to the production of good work. In this too Glasgow was
fortunate. Edward Collins who is said to have arrived in Glasgow
about 1746 is a rather shadowy figure. Supposedly from Shropshire
or Suffolk he is said to have been suspected of being a Jacobite
and to have been conscripted, against his will, by the Duke of Cumberland
during the rebellion of 1745—46. By 1756 he was established
as a papermaker at Dalmuir, near Glasgow, and in that year was awarded
a silver medal by the Edinburgh Society ‘for the greatest quantity
of the best printing paper, not under six reams’ 10 Much, if
not all, of the paper used by the Foulis brothers was purchased
from Collins and this is no doubt true of the other Glasgow printers.
It has been claimed, on somewhat doubtful grounds, that a descendant
of Edward Collins was the founder of the Glasgow publishing house
of Collins.
The Glasgow book trade flourished from the 1 740s onwards. There
were seldom fewer than eight printing offices active in the City,
although many came and went, and partnerships were in a continual
state of flux. Other than those described above, the principal printers
between 1740 and 1770 were William Duncan Junior, John Hall, John
Bryce, John Robertson and Archibald McLean. They were supported
by active booksellers and publishers such as Andrew Stalker, John
Barry, Daniel Baxter, John Gilmour and John Orr, the main Gaelic
publisher — a far cry from the 1730s when, in 1734, Alexander
Carmichael attempted, through an action in the Court of Session,
to prevent Andrew Stalker from opening a bookshop on the grounds
that ‘the place was too narrow for two booksellers at a time’.
The 1770s saw the end of an era in the Glasgow book trade. Andrew
Stalker died in 1770, Robert Urie in 1771, John Gilmour in 1772,
Andrew Foulis in 1775 and Robert in 1776. Daniel Baxter lived until
1784 but his name seldom appears in the fifteen years or so before
his death.
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Volume 2 published 1994
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