Airdrie Villages

Greengairs

Greengairs has an interesting historical link with the new Heritage Park at Summerlee, Coatbridge, because it was the Summerlee Iron Company which first mined ironstone at Greengairs in the 1840s. Coal later replaced ironstone as the main product and the local colliery changed hands five times between 1873 and 1923.

Longriggend

Longriggend began life as the longest of a group of mining villages in this area. Over a hundred houses were built in the 1870s but by the 1910only 20 houses remained and most of the pits had closed. Today only a handful of houses are to be found on the Main Street but the Community Council is one of the most active in the area.

Moffat Mills

A Victorian factory built on the outskirts of Airdrie gave its name to this village which grew up as a result of the paper-making industry. The Craig family provided housing and other amenities for their mil I workers. Takeover and rationalisation eventually put the mills out of existence and in 1963 they were sold and converted into the Inverhouse Distillery.

Just beyond Clarkston the Moffat Mills branch struck off from to the South.  One of the original routes of the Ballochney Railway to Wester Moffat Colliery, branched to Moffat Mills, this branch survived until 1985 to serve the InverHouse distillery.  There was a regular service of grain hoppers and the company (British Maltsters) even had it's own locomotive.  When the traffic ceased this locomotive was acquired by the Caledonian Railway Preservation group and moved to Brechin in December 1985

PLAINS

Plains has its origins in the growth of the mining industry.  The men of Whiterigg, Meadowhead, Ballochney, Arden and Stanrigg all working in the pits - the last of which closed over 30 years ago. In the early 1860's the population of Plains was just over 200 people.  The town grew in tandem with the area's mining industry.  In the early 1980's the population had grown to over 3,000. The railway once linked Plains to Airdrie, Caldercruix and Bathgate until bus services took over.

View of Plains Main Street taken around 1905.

Salsburgh

Salsburgh, situated at the south-eastern limit of the Monklands, is best known for the Kirk O'Shotts Parish Church, which sits at 1,000 feet above sea level on the site of a medieval chapel. Salsburgh as a community can be traced back to 1726 when it consisted of only four houses. The coal and iron interests of the Coltness Iron Company at the east of the village provided work for the villagers during the last century.

Caldercruix

Caldercruix is situated to the north-east of Airdrie on the Bathgate road and it owes its rise to the building of a paper mill and a textile printing works which attracted workers to settle there. The paper mill was famous for being powered by two of the largest water wheels in Scotland and the paper secured a high reputation for quality in Scottish and English markets with the company being particularly noted for the manufacture of blotting paper. New houses and an Institute were built for the workmen in the village and the church was even named after the mill owners and called the Craig Memorial Church.

Chapelhall

Chapelhall lies on the opposite side of the North Calder Water from Calderbank and it has a very similar history. Ironworking and coal mining were once
prominent industries here with three blast furnaces working at Chapelhall as early as the 1830s.

The old community also had a quarry, a brickworks and a bakery. The first curator of the Royal Gardens in Kew, William Aiton, began work as a gardener in the grounds of the former Woodhall House near Chapelhall.

Chapelhall now has a population of 4,639 and the industrial estates at Chapelhall and Newhouse are important employers.

Glenmavis

Glenmavis is the community formerly known as New Monkland and is the home of New Monkland Church which was originally the only church for the whole of
the parish which included Airdrie. The present building was completed in 1777 and the church has a remarkable record of only 18 ministers in charge from
the mid-17th century to the present day. Visitors to the village should also look out for the Kirkstyle Inn which also appears on the 1860 map of what was then a small hamlet. Coal mines were active at Braidenhall and Whitehill in Glenmavis until 1906.
The growth of private housing estates has changed the appearance of Glenmavis which is now mainly a commuter village for Glasgow and the rest of Lanarkshire.

Calderbank

This village lies south of Airdrie on the opposite side of the North Calder water from Chapelhall and it was a prosperous industrial settlement with a population of almost 3,500 in the middle of the last century. Ironworks and coal pits were established in the area and the proximity of the Monkland Canal was an important factor in the growth of local industry. The first iron-hulled passenger boat, the Vulcan, was constructed at nearby Faskine on the banks of the canal
and launched into it in 1819. A full scale replica of the Vulcan has been reconstructed and was the centre-piece of the District Council's display at the Glasgow Garden Festival in 1988. It was then transferred to Summerlee Heritage Park where it is now on display. After the period of iron construction was over, steel works were built on the site of the ironworks, and so heavy industry continued in Calderbank. Ship plates for the Queen Mary were made in Calderbank.

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