With one foot in the countryside and the other connected to the metropolis, Newton Mearns is the southernmost suburb of Glasgow. The parish of Mearns bounds southwards over undulating landscape and moors to Ayrshire, with the slopes of Clarkston and Busby within its northern edge, marked by the River Earn. From Rouken Glen to Fenwick Moor, from castles and mansions to farmlands, fermtouns, and cotton mills, its 800-year history records a fertile area and an ever-increasing population. In the twelfth century, King David I granted lands to Walter Fitzalan, and subsequent landowners built Mearns...