Collection T-BA - William Baird & Company Ltd records

Identity area

Reference code

GB 249 T-BA

Title

William Baird & Company Ltd records

Date(s)

  • 1830s - 1969 (Creation)

Level of description

Collection

Extent and medium

65 metres

Context area

Name of creator

(1830-1893)

Administrative history

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.

Name of creator

(1893-1938)

Administrative history

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.

Archival history

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

Content and structure area

Scope and content

Land and property records; legal documents; maps and plans; day books; financial records; production and sales records; staff time books; transport records; correspondence. Most of the records relate to the company's Gartsherrie Works.

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling

Accruals

System of arrangement

Conditions of access and use area

Conditions governing access

Some staff records are restricted in compliance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 1998.

Conditions governing reproduction

Language of material

  • English

Script of material

    Language and script notes

    Physical characteristics and technical requirements

    Finding aids

    This collection is not yet catalogued.
    A shelf-list is available.

    Allied materials area

    Existence and location of originals

    Existence and location of copies

    Related units of description

    Records of William Baird & Co Ltd (ref: GB 248 UGD 164/1) (Glasgow University Archive Services)

    Records of William Baird & Co Ltd (North Lanarkshire Archives)

    Notes area

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