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Lesbians in Peer Support (LIPS) was a youth group organised by the Glasgow Women’s Library (GWL) supporting lesbian and bisexual women and girls between the ages of 14 and 25. The group was founded in 2000, following a1999 study into poverty and social exclusion among LGB young people in Glasgow and West Scotland which found that many young lesbian and bisexual women experienced high levels of isolation and social stigma. A youth group run by Lesbian Line had recently folded, leaving little support for young queer women in Glasgow. LIPS initially received three years of funding from Comic Relief, making it GWL’s first funded project. Sue John and Shona Bruce led the project, which was launched in October 2000 in the Tron theatre as part of the Glasgay! Arts Festival.

LIPS initially held meetings at GWL on Thursday evenings, shifting to Thursdays and Saturdays in 2001. The group also later launched an under 18s subgroup. This collection records many of the activities that took place during these meetings, including creative writing, drumming and drag workshops, as well as sessions on issues such as self-esteem, sexual health and domestic violence. Alongside regular meetings, the group organised residential trips in 2001, to Manchester – where they strengthened their links to a local lesbian and bisexual youth group – and to Camas on the Isle of Mull. The group also produced a series of short films, Dykes in the City which were launched at the 2001 Glasgay! Festival.
Staff and group members of LIPS were also involved in researching and campaigning around the needs of LGBTQ people in Scotland. In partnership with the Greater Glasgow Health Board, LIPS launched Something to Tell You: Hearing the Voices of Young LGB People in 2002, a report that gathered and analysed the experiences of young gay, lesbian and bisexual people in Glasgow and West Scotland.
In 2003, GWL secured additional funding from Comic Relief to run LIPS for a further three years. As part of the next phase of the project, members of the group trained as Peer Educators to facilitate LIPS groups and support new members. Following Comic Relief’s policy of funding projects for no more than six years, LIPS began to taper off its activities from 2005, and disbanded in the following year.

Glasgow Women’s Library (GWL) has been providing information, resources and services since 1991. It developed from a broad-based arts organisation called Women in Profile, which was set up in 1987 with the aim of ensuring the representation of women’s culture during Glasgow’s year as the European City of Culture in 1990.

Since 1991 thousands of women have contributed to the growth and success of the Library. The collection has been largely donated and there have been scores of women involved in managing its projects, volunteering and contributing their time, expertise, visions and energies.

Despite the absence of revenue funding and a complete reliance on volunteers, GWL was quickly established as the central general information resource about and for women in Glasgow. People from all sections of the community donated books, magazines, journals and ephemera and by 1994 GWL’s rapid growth, both in terms of collection size and user numbers, resulted in the need to relocate to larger premises. Consequently, the organisation moved to Glasgow City Council-owned premises at 109 Trongate where it continued to expand and develop, providing learning opportunities informally in the context of the lack of any funding for this purpose.

The Library is a unique resource in Scotland but has always sought inspiration, support and links with sister organisations world-wide. Many of the Library projects, policies and initiatives have developed after peer group visits, contacts or discussions.

Over the Library’s history we have held hundreds of events, undertaken research, training and partnerships, visited and hosted workshops, conferences and exhibitions. We have visited international sister projects as well as making firm links with local and national women’s initiatives.
In 2000, GWL secured its first project funding, enabling the employment of workers for the first time. This was followed by further successful funding bids to facilitate new projects focusing on the provision of Lifelong Learning opportunities and an Adult Literacy and Numeracy Project aimed at women.

During a key period of development between 2002 and 2006, GWL secured its status as a Linked Library to the Scottish Parliament, appointed a Librarian and a Writer in Residence, undertook several research commissions on behalf of public bodies and launched its Women Make History Project. This period saw further growth in user numbers, with more than 10,000 people a year accessing the ever-expanding collection of materials and range of services.

In 2007, GWL was decanted from 109 Trongate to temporary accommodation at 81 Parnie Street (due to the development of 109 Trongate for visual arts organisations) pending a negotiated and agreed relocation to permanent self-contained premises at the Mitchell Library, for which the organisation worked towards a planned £1.5 million refurbishment. Whilst some archive materials and artefacts remained in storage at Parnie Street, project work continued and in April 2008, a new learning initiative aimed at Black and Minority Ethnic Women was launched. The new Women Make History Project researched, developed and delivered its first Women’s Heritage Walk and has since developed a further four.

In June 2008 GWL was successful in its bid for funding to the Heritage Lottery Fund and was awarded £410,000 to create a purpose-built archive space within the Mitchell Library premises and to employ an Archivist for three years to train volunteers in archive-related skills, conserve the collection and co-ordinate a programme of related public events. In addition, the Scottish Government agreed three years funding to develop GWL’s Lifelong Learning Programme at national level.

Like 109 Trongate, the temporary Parnie Street premises were also designated in 2010 as being required for visual arts project development, resulting in GWL having to move once again and take occupation of the Mitchell Library space in advance of planned renovation works. This move revealed, in fact, that the space could no longer meet GWL’s operational and strategic requirements in terms of size, functionality, vision and ambition. In the five years between the offer of these premises and the temporary move into them GWL’s growth had been significant, having increased its paid staff cohort three fold from four to 12 and doubling its number of core projects from four to eight. GWL worked with Glasgow Life to identify suitable new premises, and the former public library building in Landressy Street in Bridgeton was identified as an option for GWL by Glasgow Life as a result of the relocation of their public library service into the refurbished Olympia Building. With the support of Clyde Gateway the Library worked hard to raise money for the essential renovations needed to make Bridgeton Library fully fit for our purposes.

Having relocated to permanent premises at 23 Landressy Street in 2013, a major £1.4 million capital refurbishment project was completed in November 2015, when the Rt. Hon. Nicola Sturgeon MSP, First Minister of Scotland opened the new premises, publically declaring GWL as ‘truly a national treasure.’ This was followed in December by GWL being awarded the prestigious status of ‘Recognised Collection of National Significance’ by Museums Galleries Scotland and the Scottish Government, further cementing its status as the only Accredited Museum dedicated to women’s history in the whole of the UK.

Cathy McCormack (July 5th 1952 – present), is a Scottish grassroots activist based in EasterHouse, Glasgow, prominent for her involvement in local and international anti-poverty campaigns. Becoming part of the EastHall Residents Association (ERA) in 1982, McCormack began her activism through a Glasgow-wide Anti-Damp campaign, helping to tackle a chronic damp housing problem experienced in EasterHouse and other post-war housing schemes. McCormack’s continued campaigning in the 1990s led to her involvement in setting up the Scottish Public Health Alliance in 1992, her attendance as a Scottish representative at the United Nations Commission for Sustainable Development in 1994, and two study trips to Nicaragua and South Africa in 1992 and 1998. Today, McCormack still resides in Easterhouse Glasgow and is the author of a 2009 autobiography, ‘The Wee Yellow Butterfly’.

The National Women’s Network for International Solidarity (NWN) was a feminist networking group focused on facilitating contact for women concerned with international issues. The network was formed in 1985 during the run up to the Third World Conference in Nairobi, and was officially established in 1995. It was a non-profit organisation coordinated by volunteers and funded by grants and membership subscriptions. It aimed to connect women’s groups and individuals, and promote feminist solidarity for women’s organisations in the UK and abroad. The network also campaigned for change in the policies of governments, aid agencies and other institutions. The group dissolved in 2000 due to lack of finance.

Jessie McKirdy (1936 - present) is a peace activist who was born in Scotland and has lived in the USA since 1997. She was a member of the Glasgow Women for Peace in Glasgow in the 1980’s protesting against nuclear armaments being deployed in Scotland. As part of this, she attended the Greenham Commons Women’s Peace Camp on December 12th, 1982. Following the closure of the camp in 2000 to make way for the memorial site, McKirdy put together the papers she had kept on the Greenham Commons camp, including photographs and newspaper clippings.

Elizabeth Anderson was born 12th October 1901 in Clydebank and worked as a crane operator throughout much of her life. From 1922 to 1932, she worked at Babcock and Wilcox, and later served as a crane driver during World War 2 at John Brown’s shipyard. The shipyard, at the time, was internationally renowned, and produced many famous ships. Whilst driving the biggest gantry crane on site one shift, she misjudged a load and blew a fuse, resulting in a whole area of the yard losing electricity, though she continued to work there. She remained single throughout her life due to the death of her fiancé during the war. She was a devoted Methodist, and a member of the temperance and social welfare department of the church.

Fourwalls Housing Co-operative was a housing co-operative operating in Glasgow. It was created in order to allow single women to live in better accommodations through mutual ownership. It aimed to help single mothers and women without children, women who were homeless, whether due to unemployment or personal difficulties, and supply housing that women could independently control instead of relying on the council or landlords. They were particularly interested in ensuring buildings were energy-efficient and accessible to people with disabilities. Furthermore, they had an interest in preserving buildings of historical or architectural interest. Fourwalls Co-op was registered in 1978, but had become dormant until being offered for the women’s co-operative. The first open meeting was held in July 1983. In 1987 they were offered 33-37 Carnarvon Street by Woodlands Trust. They worked with Thenew Housing Association from 1986 onwards for professional advice and assistance. A founding member, Dianne Barry, admitted a lot of their more innovative ideas had to be scrapped, such as solar panels. The housing co-operative was still operating in 1999, housing 19 women. The company is currently listed as closed.

The Association of Radical Midwives (A.R.M) is a charity dedicated to improving maternity services both in the UK and internationally. It hosts regular meetings at a local and national level, campaigns regularly to protect women’s rights and support midwifery, and produces a quarterly magazine to provide news and updates. It was found in 1976 by a group of student midwives who were concerned with the way maternity nurses were treated during their training. The acronym is a pun on the term ‘Artificial Rupture of Membranes’, or artificially induced labour, which was routinely overused at the time. It is the hope of A.R.M. that they can restore midwifery to a position where midwives’ skills are used in full, alongside the benefits of modern technological advances to give woman and child the best possible chance.

The London Lesbian Offensive Group (L.L.O.G.) was a feminist lesbian activist group focussed on contesting anti-lesbianism. It was officially formed after strong interest shown at the 1982 Lesbian Conference workshop called “On Anti-Lesbian in the WLM”. It was comprised of women with differing feminist politics, all concerned with the prevalence of anti-lesbianism, and sought to prove the anti-lesbianism should be identified as political oppression. There was also a strong focus on the treatment of lesbian mothers, as most of the core members were mothers themselves. They held meetings and workshops for other women to attend, wrote articles and collaborated with other lesbian activist groups, and held discussions considering the Women’s Liberation Movement and its impact on lesbian women.

The Josephine Butler Society, originally known as the Ladies National Association (LNA), was founded by Josephine Butler (1828 – 1906), and was created in order to oppose the Contagious Disease Acts of 1864, 1866 and 1869. These Acts focussed on suppressing venereal disease in the armed forces. The 1869 act controversially forced women suspected of being a prostitute to be examined and, if found to be infected, be quarantined for up to three months. The LNA campaigned against such measures, and in 1886 the Contagious Diseases Acts were repealed. The LNA further campaigned against sex trafficking and child prostitution, and it was their efforts that raised the age of consent to 16 in 1885, as well as introducing measures to suppress brothels and prevent trafficking. In 1915, the LNA joined with the British Branch of the International Abolitionist Federation (IAF), also founded by Josephine Butler, to become the Association for Moral and Social Hygiene (AMSH). The society took Josephine Butler’s name in 1962. The society acts to this day as a pressure group campaigning against the legalisation of prostitution, the trafficking of women and the marginalisation of those vulnerable to being forced into the profession.