Item 13 - 'Glasgow and the Barony thereof: a review of three hundred years and more’ by John Marshall Lang

The Reverend John Marshall Lang was a son of the parish minister at Glassford. On completing his studies at the University of Glasgow, Lang followed his father into the Church of Scotland, serving successively as minister of the parishes of Kilmun, Aberdeen and Fyvie. From 1965 to 1968 he was minister of Anderson, where he installed the first organ to be used within the Church of Scotland, and also introduced psalms chanted in prose. Lang was subsequently called to Morningside Church in Edinburgh, before being transferred to the Barony parish in Glasgow in 1873. When the old Barony Church building was deemed to be in a state of terminal disrepair, Lang and his parishioners raised the money to build a new church, completed in 1889.

Among his many achievements, Lang introduced evening church services in Glasgow and also served as Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1893. Upon leaving the Barony parish in 1900, he became Principal of the University of Aberdeen. His son, Cosmo Gordon Lang (1864-1945) was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1928-1942.