Looking back with Ian Scott on the rise and fall of Falkirk tobacco shops

Today I suppose the same urges are satisfied by ‘vape shops’ but I for one prefer to remember the 1950s and 60s when a vast range of colourfully packaged cigarettes, cigarillos and snuff along with pipes and other smokers’ paraphernalia filled the tobacconists’ windows. These were exotic places where the smells of Turkish, Russian and Virginian tobaccos, Cuban cigars, Rangoon cheroots, black plug and scented Dutch mixtures filled the air.

I admit I had a special interest – not only was I a smoker but I did spend a very interesting year in the 60s working for Rothmans in Glasgow where my job was devising ways in which we could persuade more people to smoke more fags, more often. I know. A shameful trade but I was young and innocent… and the ciggies were free!

Falkirk had a large number of tobacconists over the years – for example in 1960 there were 17 shops in the town - but without doubt the High Street emporium of James Clarkson and Son was the most celebrated. It stood at the junction of the High Street and Robert’s Wynd next to the entrance to the Howgate Centre today. At the turn of the century the growing popularity of the cigarette brought a hundred and one different packets with fantastic names like Passing Clouds, Prize Crop, Craven A, Black Sobranie, Sweet Afton, Pasha, Wild Woodbine, Guards, Camel and Cogent and as children we used to collect the fronts of the packets and swap them like the football cards that were often given away with the cigarettes. Even more difficult to understand today was the habit of ‘taking snuff’, in other words, sniffing up a pinch of finely ground tobacco and very much the favourite of the gentry - I remember little round tins with names like ‘The Parson’s Pleasure’!

The original James Clarkson started out in business in 1875 down in Grahamston and at first he was selling some quite unusual non-tobacco products. One advert addressed to “All Moulders” offered ‘superior West of Scotland moulders’ tools’ including ‘flange bead upsets’ and ‘pipe sleckers’! However the tobacco business flourished and in the 1880s he was able to built several houses and shops for rent in Dalderse Avenue and a tenement building in Grahams Road along with a second tobacco shop. In 1892 he acquired the business premises of Mr Rennie at 93 High Street and the shop we best remember opened its doors. One advert in 1898 says:

“All lovers of the weed know Clarkson’s shop at the corner of the High Street and Robert’s Wynd. Mr Clarkson’s stock is distinguished for its variety and good quality and he must be a fastidious lover of My Lady Nicotine who fails to have his tastes suited.”

The successful family business passed to the next James and expanded again with a second shop in the High Street and another in Vicar Street and by the 1920s the firm had added a whole range of other household goods to the well known tobaccos. The business survived into the 1960s but as the medical evidence of serious harm increased, the trade declined closure followed. Clarkson’s and the others are now just a colourful part of our history. Will the vape shops ever acquire the same status? Somehow I doubt it.