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The West of Scotland Agricultural College was established in 1899, on the merger of the Scottish Dairy Institute and the agricultural department of the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College.

In 1900, the College was located in Blythswood Square, Glasgow. In 1927, the estate of Auchincruive, Ayr, belonging to the late John Hannah of Girvan Mains, Girvan, was presented to the College. Initially, the Blythswood site was a major centre for teaching and administration whilst the Auchincruive site was devoted to activities such as farming, poultry husbandry, horticulture and estate forestry. In 1974, the Blythswood Square site was closed.

In 1990, the College became part of the Scottish Agricultural College.

The West of Scotland Science Park was a joint venture between the Universities of Glasgow and Strathclyde and the Scottish Development Agency. Its aim was to attract and stimulate the growth of high-technology industries in Scotland.

The White Lung Association (WLA) is a worker-led nonprofit organisation that was set up in San Pedro, California, in 1979. Shipyard workers were instrumental its foundation. By 1984 the WLA's mission had expanded to educating the general public to the hazards of asbestos exposure, and a national office in Baltimore, MD. The WLA developed programs of public education and consults with victims of asbestos exposure, school boards, building owners, government agencies, and others interested in identifying asbestos hazards and developing control programs. It is funded by donations and by fees for its services.

In 1893, William Baird & Company was incorporated as William Baird & Company Ltd.

In 1931, the company's Ayrshire coal interests were combined with those of the Dalmellington Iron Company, of Dalmellington, East Ayrshire, to form Bairds & Dalmellington Ltd. The new company, seventy-five per cent of which was owned by William Baird & Company Ltd, controlled seventy per cent of the Ayrshire coalfields.

In around 1938, the company underwent reorganisation and entered voluntary liquidation. William Baird & Co Ltd was reconstituted, and the company's Lanarkshire interests were merged with the Scottish Iron & Steel Company Ltd, of Glasgow, to form Bairds & Scottish Steel Ltd, pig iron and steel manufacturers.

William Baird & Company was established in 1830 by William and James Baird. The company had its origins in 1816, when Alexander Baird, whose family is recorded as having owned land in Lanarkshire, Scotland as far back as the 13th century, began working coal leases there. By 1826, he and his sons owned numerous coal and mineral leases. In 1828, two of Alexander’s sons, William and James, began to erect the Gartsherrie Ironworks at Gartsherrie, North Lanarkshire, Scotland, and within fifteen years the works had grown to be the largest in the country with sixteen furnaces. In 1830, William and James took over all the coal leases and formed William Baird & Company.

In around 1843, William and James Baird were involved in the establishment of the Eglinton Iron Company that managed the Gartsherrie Ironworks, building furnaces at Kilwinning, North Ayrshire and purchasing furnaces at Blair and Dalry, North Ayrshire in 1852, Lugar, East Ayrshire in 1856, and Portland in 1864. By the mid 1860s, the company was producing twenty-five per cent of Scotland's output of pig iron with the capacity to produce 300,000 tons per year, and employing 10,000 men and boys. Bairds was probably the largest single producer of pig iron in the world at that time. The company operated blast furnaces at Gartsherrie, coke ovens at Kilsyth, Stirlingshire and Bedlay, Lanarkshire and collieries at Bothwell and Bedlay in Lanarkshire, Kilsyth, and Bathgate, West Lothian. They also owned cement works at Gartsherrie and brickworks at Gartshore, Dunbartonshire.

In 1852, the company was the first to introduce the cylindrical furnace in Scotland. It also experimented with blast heaters, raising the heat to 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Gartsherrie Ironworks gained a reputation for technical sophistication and attracted visitors from England, Europe and America. The Bairds provided schools, churches and recreational institutes for their workforce but opposed trade unionism. The Baird brothers also had considerable interests in banking and held twenty-nine railway company directorships and five chairmanships.

By the 1870s, the company was working mines in the North East of England, in what was the county of Cumberland, and also in Spain. In 1893, the firm was incorporated as William Baird & Company Ltd.

William Robertson Shipowners Ltd, a private limited company, was formed in 1949 to take over the assets of the shipping business, William Robertson, including the ownership of its fleet of steamers and motor ships. The management of the fleet, however, was left in the hands of the old William Robertson partnership.

In 1952, Kneeshaw Lupton & Company Ltd, a quarrying business which for many years had been closely associated with the business, was made a wholly owned subsidiary of William Robertson Shipowners Ltd.

In the 1950s, the company invested in the Norwegian shipping line, Thor Thoresen Linje.

In 1958, the company changed its name to Gem Line Ltd. At the same time, the old William Robertson partnership was wound up and a new company, called William Robertson Shipowners Ltd, was formed to continue the management of the fleet.

The business diversified into geological research and consultancy, forming the Robertson Research Company Ltd in 1961. In the same year, it also formed the Ailsa Craig Quarrying Company Ltd.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the company invested in new and larger ships, but by 1970 the coastal trade had declined, with the advent of vast containers using large, deep water ports. As a result, in 1970, the company was taken over by Powell Duffryn Ltd, the owners of Stephenson Clarke Shipping Ltd. In 1971, following the takeover, the company reverted to its former name, William Robertson Shipowners Ltd. In 1976, the company was formally made a subsidiary of Stephenson Clarke Shipping Ltd, although it continued to trade under its own name. In 1987, it changed its name to Gem Line (Management) Ltd. The company was dissolved in 1997.

William Robertson Shipowners Ltd was formed in 1958 to take over the management of the William Robertson fleet of ships. In 1969, it became a wholly owned subsidiary of its associated company, Gem Line Ltd. In 1970, both Gem Line Ltd and William Robertson Shipowners Ltd were acquired by Powell Duffryn Ltd. Following this, in 1971, the whole of the business of William Robertson Shipowners Ltd was transferred to Gem Line Ltd. Gem Line Ltd was renamed William Robertson Shipowners Ltd whilst William Robertson Shipowners was renamed Gem Line Ltd. The new Gem Line Ltd remained in existence but was little more than a shell. It appears to have been wound up in 1975.

The William Robertson shipping business was founded in 1852 by William Robertson, whose first venture as a ship owner was the purchase of the scow or barge, Ellen, which plied on the Forth and Clyde Canal and the Clyde Estuary. His next acquisitions were the lighter, Gem, in 1854, the Ruby in 1855 and the Pearl in 1859. He acquired his first steamer or puffer, the Jasper, in 1865 and his first sea-going steamer, Agate, in 1878. His first diesel powered vessel, the Sapphire, was purchased in 1935. The names of the ships were all derived from minerals, precious and semiprecious stones. The business concentrated on coastal tramp ships, trading commodities such as coal and limestone among the ports of Great Britain, Ireland, France, the Netherlands and the Baltic. In 1885, Robertson also began managing ships for others. The business expanded rapidly and, by the outbreak of war in 1914, owned 49 vessels. A number of ships were lost to enemy action, however, during the two world wars.

In 1922, the business acquired a large quarrying operation at Llandulas in North Wales, which was registered under the name Kneeshaw, Lupton and Co Ltd.

In 1949, a private limited company, William Robertson Shipowners Ltd, was formed to take over the assets of the William Robertson partnership. The management of the fleet, however, was left in the hands of the partnership. The partnership appears to have been wound up in 1958, when William Robertson Shipowners Ltd changed its name to Gem Line Ltd and a new company called William Robertson Shipowners Ltd was formed to continue the management of the fleet.

The first chair of its type in the world, the Young Chair of Technical Chemistry was established in 1869 as the result of a munificent gift by James 'Paraffin' Young (1811-1883). Young, a former student and assistant to Professor Thomas Graham at Anderson's University, made his fortune from the Scottish shale oil industry and other industrial processes, and was a major benefactor of the University. He became a Trustee in 1858 and served as President of Anderson's University from 1868 to 1877. The proposal to found a Chair of Technical Chemistry met fierce opposition from the existing chemistry professors, who feared that the establishment of the new chair would result in a decline in student numbers attending their own classes. The Young Laboratory was housed in a building adjoining the Andersonian, and was equipped to the best modern standards.

The Young Chair was technically independent of Anderson's University until 1887, when it was absorbed into the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College.