Did Blantyre coin this phrase?

Screen Shot 2017-04-22 at 18.38.18This comment in a Scottish story from the 1920s confused me significantly!

The reader is clearly talking about a dog, but when his wife says “its a border terrier”, the man scratched his head and said “it looks mair like a Blantyre riot!”

It made me wonder if this was a National Scottish joke of the time. Have you ever heard the saying “he/she looks like a riot? I have and you probably have too……..now I’m wondering if this stems directly from the Blantyre riots of 1887!”

Is Blantyre (in)famous for coining the Scots slang phrase,
“he / she looks like a riot”??

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