SOMETIMES taking pictures of pigeons was as exciting as Glasgow got on a Sunday. The two photographers are American sailors who had arrived in the Firth of Clyde in September, 1957, for one of Nato's largest ever maritime exercises, Operation Strike Back, when nearly 100 ships took part in mock attacks off Scotland to show the Russians that the West was as ready as ever. The 80 American and British ships in the exercise were berthed briefly in the Clyde sparking a huge tourism exercise as steamers and boats took onlookers around the fleet.
Some 20,000 sailors were given shore leave with all shops in Largs, Dunoon, Greenock, Glasgow and Edinburgh that sold anything tartan becoming quickly sold out. Dances were arranged where local girls were happily dealing with five men to every woman.
In the fifties though, pubs did not open on a Sunday, although bona fide travellers could drink in hotels. As the American consul general Belton O. Bryan loftily declared to The Herald: "I am sure that what they found lacking in the way of open bars on a Sunday was amply compensated by the welcome given by the ordinary man in the street.
"Personally I don't think Glasgow should change its habit of keeping Sunday. Our men can suffer being without a drink for 12 hours without taking any harm."
Tell that to the two chaps here snapping pigeons.
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