Whifflet (North Lanarkshire)

Lat:55.8560 Lon: -4.0217

Once a colliery village, Whifflet is now a suburb of Coatbridge in North Lanarkshire.

Rich local sources of coal and ironstone led several ironworks to be set up in Coatbridge during the 19th Century. The rapid expansion of the population led to huge pressure on local land and resources. Coatbridge became overcrowded and heavily polluted.

Whifflet was home to a heavy concentration of industry in the 19th and early 20th Centuries, with mining, iron works and a tinplate works all based here. These were served by a range of railway lines and junctions.

The building shown in the archive image is the Coatbridge Tinplate Works, although by this time it had converted to manufacturing malleable iron.

The lack of smoke suggests the photograph was taken during a holiday period. When the factories were active, the view would have been obscured by heavy smoke.

In the 20th Century, the exhaustion of local mineral deposits and a drop in demand for iron led to decline of Coatbridge's industry. One by one the ironworks failed, with the giant Gartsherrie works the last to close in 1967.

Today, employment in Coatbridge is mainly in light industry, services and retail. Many residents commute to work elsewhere.

Features of the area

• Mine
• Town
• Industry

North Lanarkshire Group

North Lanarkshire is one of Scotland’s 32 unitary council areas. It borders City of Glasgow , Stirling, Falkirk, East Dunbartonshire, West Lothian and South Lanarkshire.

The council covers parts of the former counties of Lanarkshire, Dunbartonshire, and Stirlingshire. It was formed in 1996, largely from the Cumbernauld and Kilsyth, Motherwell and Monklands districts of Strathclyde Region.

Elsewhere on the BBC

• BBC: A History of the World: Bar of Pig Iron
• BBC Glasgow and West Scotland

Elsewhere on the web

• Scottish Mining: Manufacture of Ironstone
• Summerlee: Museum of Scottish Industrial Life
• Wikipedia entry on Coatbridge
• North Lanarkshire Council: Museums and Heritage Service