THE foundation of the United States of America was disastrous for the Tobacco Lords of Glasgow, some of whom lost their plantations in the new country, but it forced the city fathers to address the issue of the lack of manufacturing capacity in and around Glasgow.
There was a wide variety of products made in Glasgow just before the American Revolution which showed the change that was occurring in the city over the space of 30 years.
Alexander ‘Jupiter’ Carlyle wrote in his famous memoirs that in the year 1744: “There were not manufacturers sufficient,” either there or at Paisley, to supply an outward-bound cargo for Virginia.