Cross Keys February 2021 (Freemasonry)

Cartside House Over the years there have been a number of articles about the Houstoun family in which the lodge has been named after, in particular Bro. William Houstoun, the first master (at least on paper). By that, I mean he must have attended the inaugural meeting, but did not attend anything thereafter. This was possibly due to a number of reasons including his attempt at building the canal from Glasgow to Ardrossan through Johnstone which ultimately failed when the railways took over House in December, 1875. Around 1877 the transport. paper manufacturer Peter McLaurin moved into the house with his family. McLaurin in The original mill partnership, Houstoun, 1849 had founded the Glasgow firm Smith Burns and Company, was dissolved with the and McLaurin, which pioneered the manufacdeath of Bro. George Houston (member of ture of gummed paper. In 1869 he had purGlasgow Kilwinning No.4 & 242) in 1815, and chased the Houston’s Cartside Cotton Mill, the mill, house and 19 acres of Cartside be- which he converted into a paper mill to procame the responsibility of his second son duce a wide range of paper products – William, who operated the business as gummed tape, pasteboards, cardboard and George Houston and Company. Bro. William label cloth paper suitable for envelopes and Houston (1781-1856) lived in Johnstone Cas- books. tle with his elder brother Bro. Ludovic (affiliated to 242 in 1811), who had become After Peter McLaurin’s death in 1909 one of laird in 1815, before moving to Cartside his sons, Duncan McLaurin, returned to join House shortly after his marriage in 1845. His his brothers in the family business. He was elder son George Ludovic Houston (not in the living at Cartside House in 1914 with his widCraft), who was to succeed his uncle as laird owed mother and his brother Alexander. In of Johnstone in 1862, was born at Cartside in 1931 Johnstone Town Council, driven by the 1846, Houstoun extended the mill, making an housing needs of the Burgh, acquired Cartaddition in 1825 which nearly doubled its side House and the grounds for housing, and size. the following year extended the burgh boundaries to include the property. Five Cartside House, with about 8 acres of polices, years earlier it had purchased neighbouring was regularly leased out. From 1862 it was Linn House and policies, and now brought occupied by the Glasgow East India merchant forward proposals to build 220 houses for Archibald Glen. Following losses in his busi- over 900 people on the joint 32-acre site. ness with Singapore, Malaya and the Phili- Cartside House, which had stood at the juncpinnes, Glen went bankrupt in 1874 with lia- tion of Cartside Avenue and Beach Road, was bilities of £150,000, and died at Cartside demolished soon after.

Cross Keys February 2021