Castlemilk Lads Tracked Down

The subjects of an iconic photograph – featuring three boys from Castlemilk, in Glasgow – have been tracked down, almost 50 years after the picture was taken.

The photograph – by Oscar Marzaroli – was taken in 1963 and in today's Scotland on Sunday Spectrum magazine, the photograph is recreated by Robert Perry, with the story of the lads' subsequent lives captured by Peter Ross. 

Writes Ross: “The faces of the boys, then, are famous, but they themselves remained unknown. Marzaroli did not take their names. He did not wish to intrude beyond taking the photograph. Yet, as the poet Edwin Morgan put it in 1984, 'It is impossible not to wonder what the Castlemilk Lads are like today'. And as the years have passed, this instinct has grown ever stronger. Are they alive? Have they had good lives? Whatever happened to the Castlemilk Lads?

“Last year, I decided to find out. I put up posters around Castlemilk, forlorn notices of the sort one might make for a lost cat. One day a message was left on my phone by a woman called Emily. I think, she said, you are looking for my brother.”