Among the postcard collection held by Bute Museum are a couple of cards, one sent from a small boy staying at the
Stevenson Home and one from his two sisters at the Agnes Patrick Home. These homes were established in 1900 by
Agnes Patrick, a Bute philanthropist with the Agnes Patrick Home for girls and the Stevenson Home up the hill, for boys.
The homes were run by Glasgow Corporation as part of the Glasgow Poor Children’s Fresh-Air Fortnight scheme which
was set up to give disadvantaged children from Glasgow a chance for a break in the open air and a better diet for a short
time. As with many postcards there is just as much of interest in the message on the back and this is the case with these
two postcards. The cards were sent to their parents, in Glasgow, in June 1925 by Thomas and his two sisters, Lizzie and
Mary . The girls’ card reads “Dear Mother, We are enjoying ourselves and we hope you are the same. This is a view of
the home.”
Thomas’s card gives a little more information. “Dear Parents (though only addressed to his mum Mrs Donald)
I hope you are keeping well and if you are sending anything for us Lizzie and Mary are separated from me they are in the
Agnes Patrick home below me. Thomas Donald.”
Though none of the three children who stayed on Bute married in later life, both the girls lived to a good age with Lizzie dying in Bishopbriggs in 2011, aged 93 and Mary dying in Glasgow in 2012 aged 98. Thomas died in Kilwinning in 1978 aged 66. (P03-4009, A3.305) (Ascog)