ARTHUR KAY
A SON of Mr. J. R. Kay, who sits with him on the
directorate of Messrs. Arthur & Company, Limited, Mr. Arthur Kay was born south
of the Border. At Park School, Glasgow, before the age of twelve, he took prizes
in Greek, Botany, and Roman History. Afterwards, in Rossall School, in
Lancashire, among many other prizes, he took two firsts for painting in oils,
became head of the school in geography and plain arithmetic, and in the Public
School Competition for the gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society, in
which he represented Rossall, he came out third. He also made his mark in school
athletics, winning the long jump and high jump under 16. and taking several
prizes for flat racing. In the school rifle corps he won his marksmanship badge,
and for two years he shot in the school eight at Wimbledon. Later at Glasgow
University, he was asterisked for classics, was Prize Essayist in the late
Professor Nichol's Senior Literature Class, and after winning the Menteith-French
Scholarship subsequent to being bracketed equal with five others, found himself
disqualified by the fact of his birth in England.
In the vacations of 1879, 1880, and 1881 he studied at Paris, Hanover, Leipzig,
and Berlin. While still in his teens he spent nearly two years in South Africa
and Australia with a view to acquiring a knowledge of the colonies, and he
joined an expedition for "big game" shooting, which made its way to the north of
the Limpopo, a region then almost unexplored. His impressions of both colonies
were afterwards embodied in two papers read before the Glasgow Philosophical
Society.
As a director of Arthur & Company, Limited, the second largest ratepayers in
Glasgow after the railway companies, Mr. Kay has taken a keen interest in the
financial undertakings of the Corporation. He came prominently before the
citizens as leader of the agitation against Sir Samuel Chisholm's Housing
Scheme. Considering this scheme a dangerous movement in the direction of
municipal socialism, he opposed it in the press, in pamphlets, and on platform,
obtained its unanimous condemnation at a meeting of the Chamber of Commerce, the
largest on record, raised the money to oppose it, and saw the Provisional Order
thrown out on its own evidence before the committee. He is also a vigorous
critic of the Corporation's methods of finance. Among other matters he objects
to the fact that the Corporation holds over £2,000,000 borrowed from small
depositors on monthly call, considering that if suddenly demanded in a time of
public stress, such liability might lead to serious embarrassment. He also
objects to the practice of employing the city's sinking fund in fresh
undertakings, instead of actually paying off debt - thus accumulating a huge
municipal capital which the Corporation may use to compete in trade against its
own ratepayers. To combat these practices he founded the Ratepayers' Federation,
Limited, of which he is chairman, and he gave evidence at great length before
the Joint Select Committee on Municipal Trading in 1903. He also read a vigorous
paper before the Philosophical Society in 1903 on "Municipal Trading with a
special reference to the Sinking Funds of Glasgow Corporation," and he published
an exhaustive analysis of the intromissions of "The Corporation of Glasgow as
owners of Shops, Tenements, and Warehouses."
Previously Mr. Kay was known chiefly by the interest which he took in the fine
arts. He is a specialist on early Dutch painting, and has frequently lent
pictures from his fine collection to enrich local and other exhibitions. He has
made an exhaustive study and formed a valuable collection of Japanese lacquer
work. He is a member of the Burlington Fine Arts Club, a Fellow of the Society
of Antiquaries at Burlington House, London, and he has written much in the
Glasgow and London press, and spoken on local art occasions in advocacy of the
best interests of art in municipal picture buying. He is also Hon. Treasurer of
the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts, and a Vice-President of the
Council of the Tariff Reform League, London.
Mr. Kay is a Justice of the Peace for the County of the City of Glasgow. His
wife is a daughter of Captain John Grahame, son of Major Grahame of Glenny, a
sister of Captain G. C. Grahame, and cousin of General Sir Archibald Hunter,
K.C.B., D.S.O., etc.
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Index of Glasgow Men (1909)