Where did you all go ?

[OlderGlaswegianLivingInDevon]

May I ask a question ?

I agree / admit I am not Jewish, however my question comes from something I said in a different thread.

Growing up in Glasgow in the 60's/70's there was a decent size Jewish population. Yes I guess Jewish people were a minority but there was def a community.

For those of you that may be unaware, in the 60's / 70's there was very much a divide in the South side of Glasgow - I can't say regarding anywhere else in Scotland as I lived in Glasgow and was a child.

There were Protestant communities and Catholic communities, and basically you lived in one of the communities that you ' belonged ' to.
There would be a local Church of Scotland, and generally the local Primary school would have Christmas and Easter services there and the Minister would come and do the school assembly on a Friday.

So altho the school did not have the word / name Netherlee ' Church of Scotland ' School - it was a Church of Scotland school. It was and still is I believe just Netherlee School.

Any Jewish children in my area came to my school, they did not go to the Catholic Primary school - as there wasn't one nearby !
so it would have been a few miles journey to get there.

The Rabbi came in every Friday morning and the Jewish children went with him to a classroom whilst we went to the hall for our assembly.
I would guess there was at least 10 children in this group, and they weren't all siblings as I am pretty sure the boy in my class did not have younger siblings, and any older ones had already moved up to Secondary school, and the girl in the next class didn't have siblings that I knew of.

There was also a Church of Scotland in Stamperland ( about a mile or so ? away ) and children living in Stamperland also came to Netherlee School.

There was a Synagogue in Stamperland.

There is no longer a Synagogue in Stamperland !

which eventually leads to my question.

Where did the Jewish people that lived in Netherlee and Stamperland go ?

Did they move out of Glasgow ?
Did they relocate to Israel ?
or did they move to Newton Mearns / Whitecraigs and Giffnock generally more affluent areas :) and actually they would have had a larger Jewish population / community.

Tho I would have said that in the 60's / 70's there were 2 or 3 Synagogues in Giffnock and now there is one ?
indeed I have just Googled and been told that Newton Mearns merged with Giffnock.

which makes me think / guess the Jewish community is decreasing ?
or moving.

Thank you.
I realise that after typing all of that out, it was pretty area specific but maybe similar has happened elsewhere in the UK ?

Same happened in Liverpool!

A lot left for London, Manchester, Israel.

The 1960s saw a big migration.

People either wanted a more religious community or a bigger city.

It’s happened in all of the “provincial” (i.e. not London or Manchester) communities in the UK.

My Dad was born in Glasgow, he lived there with his siblings and parents for a few years and then they moved down to North London. I will have to ask him if he knows why they moved.

Hi OP, I'm younger than you but my Jewish friends in Glasgow are still there just not practicing. They went to a Jewish school. My family are from Edinburgh and hid they were Jewish so attended council school but no one would have known. Don't think I'm really adding anything to your question though but maybe another piece of the puzzle!

Sorry meant to add, could it be a generational thing where younger people are less religious? Not many young people go to church regularly I'm sure, probably only for life events or Christmas services at most?

Thank you all for replying,

I think @PurpleChrayn probably hit the nail on the head with ' People either wanted a more religious community or a bigger city. '

which kind of fits in with the reply from @Daisyqueen45 re her Dad having moved from Glasgow to North London.

@Mummabear04 I believe there is only one Jewish school in Glasgow and it is, and always has been ? in the Newton Mearns / Whitecraigs area ( tho I believe it did relocate, and shares grounds with a different school )

and yes if people are not practising there will be less need / want for a Synagogue in an area.

and it's the same with the Church of Scotland as I saw a while ago that Stamperland Church was up for sale,
and with a bit of Googling I found that Stamperland and Netherlee have merged and ' my ' Church was renamed as a result thus including the name of both areas.

and yes Church attendance is dropping, and I guess it has been for a while / a long time.

I don't go, never did. I managed to drop out of Sunday School as soon as I could. My parents rarely did, only went to communion ( which is different to Communion in the Church of England or the Catholic Church ) as it was only held something like every 3 months.

Seconding what @PurpleChrayn said- I had a great great aunt and uncle in Bournemouth and family in other places over the UK outside the major Jewish communities, but over time, the younger generation generally moved to the larger Jewish communities if they were more religious (Manchester/London etc), or if they were less religious, didn’t necessarily remain living in their birth city.

Yes, it is difficult and expensive to be Jewish outside of a community. Travelling to the mikveh (2+ hrs each way for me, after dark!) is a faff, kosher food delivery is unaffordable, we need community support...