Alexander Paterson Somerville, a Glasgow businessman, artist and founder of the St Mungo Prize, photographed c 1923 seated in his car on a country road.
In 1936 an anonymous donor gave £13,500 for a trust fund to endow a prize - a gold medal and £1,000 - to be awarded every three years to the person deemed to have done most in the previous three years by way of action, instruction or suggestion: to beautify the city, to increase the well-being of the citizens, to purify the atmosphere, to foster better relations between all classes, to extend cultural and educational development, and to bring Glasgow into honourable prominence. Somerville was named as the donor on his death in 1949.
The first prize winner, in 1940, was Lord Provost Patrick Dollan. Subsequent winners have been: 1943: Dr Tom Honeyman; 1946: Sir William Burrell; 1949: Sir Stephen Bilsland; 1952: Dr. Violet Roberton; 1955 Evelyn MacKenzie Anderson; 1958: John D Kelly; 1961: Rev Dr Nevile Davidson; 1964: Rev Tom Allan; 1967: Professor Ferguson Anderson; 1970: Sir Alexander Gibson; 1973: Arthur Oldham; 1976: Sir Samuel Curran; 1979: Dorothy Henderson; 1982: Fred Paton; 1985: Professor Gavin Arneil; 1988: Jack House; 1991: Susan Baird; 1994: Giles Havergal; 1997: George Parsonage; 2002: Sheila Halley.
Reference: P7/2/9
Reproduced with the permission of Strathclyde University Archives
Keywords:
artists, awards, benefactors, motor cars, philanthropists, prizewinners, St Mungo Prize
You have 1 image in your photo album.
