The "Rat Pit" model in Glasgow Muse Lane

[RJ_Paton]

r05575 I also have a relative born at 39 Muse Lane. Was this the rat pit?

Unfortunately I can find nothing which gives the full street address of the Model (it's not listed in any of the post office directories although those ran and owned by Glasgow Corporation are) but looking at the street plans for Muse Lane no. 39 appears to be a tenement building.
(Although in other areas of the City the Corporation did build and run "Model Tenement" blocks - there is nothing to suggest that was the case here.)

The term Model Lodging House was originally coined to describe purpose built units which were intended to show the benefits of better quality accomodation for the "poor" & working class to provide a "model" for their future way of life. However the term was basically hijacked and came to mean any Dormitory type of accomodation whether provided by charities or the Corporation.

[sancti]

According to VR's, number 39 was a house but part of a tenement

Lodging house was Number 6

[Poppy62]

If you read the book The Rat Pit you will find that it was a slum tenement. The poorest of the poor resided there mostly a lot of Irish immigrants.
I had ancestors that resided at Muse Lane , not 39 but I'm sure  the other tenements would not have been in any better condition.

[seannachai]

Muse Lane was a horrific, over-crowded slum in the Cowcaddens.  It was cleared around 1923 with most of the residents going to the new Hamiltonhill slum clearance housing scheme.  Details in:  Seán Damer (2018):  "Scheming: A Social History of Glasgow Council Housing 1919-1956," Edinburgh University Press, Chapter 3, pp. 30-55.  As many contributors have said, the Rat-Pit was a female lodging-house in Muse Lane graphically described in Patrick MacGill's novel "The Rat-Pit," first published in 1915, and republished subsequently several times.     

[weecharlie]

Just found out from the 1921 census that my Grandfather ( Samuel McNeill ) also live in 39 Muse Lane with my Grandmother, Mother in Law and Sister in Law. No doubt soon to be decanted to the Possil area. 

[doddsie4]

r05575,
            In 1902, the residents of Muse Lane were...

                  Number 3: Mrs Jane Kinloch
                             25: Mrs Helen Campbell
                             60: Isabella Docherty
                             44: Mrs Margaret Polland

[cronecat]

Muse Lane was the address on my grandad's baptism record in 1909. 

[daisy1942]

Thank you so much for this series of posts.  I stumbled on this quite by accident but many of my FIL's family were born/ lived in Muse Lane so it give an interesting insight into the terrible conditions.

Indeed. the family were moved to Bonhill Street near Hamiltonhill.  thank you all for anothe piece of my jigsaw!

[MonicaL]

A few photos here of interest from Virtual Mitchell https://vm.colinwaddell.com/search/?&tags=Muse%20Lane

'The Wife of Muse Lane' https://vimeo.com/477390832 - no hiding place on how miserable conditions were in the 19th C.

Monica