Staithes

Staithes
Coble in the river at Staithes at low water
Staithes  Staithes shown within North Yorkshire
OS grid reference	NZ779185
District	Scarborough
Shire county	North Yorkshire
Region	Yorkshire and the Humber
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	SALTBURN-BY-THE-SEA
Postcode district	TS13
Police	North Yorkshire
Fire	North Yorkshire
Ambulance	Yorkshire
EU Parliament	Yorkshire and the Humber
List of places: UK • England • Yorkshire

Staithes is a seaside village in North Yorkshire, England. Roxby Beck, a stream running through Staithes, is the border between the Borough of Scarborough and Redcar and Cleveland. Formerly one of the largest and most productive fishing centres in England, Staithes is now largely a tourist destination.

History

At the turn of the 20th century, there were 80 full time fishing boats putting out from Staithes. A hundred years later there is only one, a family fishing operation worked by three generations of the Hanson family. There is a long tradition of using the coble (a traditional locally made fishing vessel) in Staithes.

Features

View of the harbour from above

Staithes street

Staithes rooftops

Panorama of Staithes from the harbour at low water

Staithes has a sheltered harbour, bounded by high cliffs and two long breakwaters. A mile to the west, Boulby Cliff is the highest cliff in England. For a brief period Boulby Cliff was mined for alum, a mineral used to improve the strength and permanency of colour when dying cloth. The mining operation was relatively short lived as a cheaper chemical method was developed. The ruined remnants of the mines can be seen from the cliff top when walking the Cleveland Way between Staithes and Skinningrove.

Staithes is a destination for geologists researching the ancient Jurassic (Lias), often fossiliferous strata in the cliffs surrounding the village. In the early 1990s a rare fossil of a seagoing dinosaur was discovered after a rockfall between Staithes and Port Mulgrave to the south. This fossil has been the focus of an ongoing project to remove the ancient bones of the creature. Port Mulgrave remains one of the best places on the northern coast to find fossils of ammonites and many visitors spend hours cracking open the shaly rocks on the shoreline in the hope of finding a perfect specimen.

Besides its human residents, known to other nearby villages as "Ringers," it has a very large population of gulls and other seabirds nesting on the cliffs. The permanent population of the village has dwindled due to more than half of the cottages being second homes owned by outsiders from cities such as Leeds and York and further afield. During the winter, when there are fewer visitors, it can seem like a ghost town. Though fewer than half of the cottages in the old village are occupied by Ringers, the traditions of the village have not yet died: many of the local women still wear Staithes bonnets (some can still be bought today in the Gift Shop in Staithes!) for the annual nightgown parade, and the Staithes Fisher Men's Choir is still going strong. There is active local participation in the local RNLI Lifeboat crew, with the Porritt Family providing many of the past and present crew members.

Art in Staithes

The village was home to a group of twenty to thirty artists known as the "Staithes group" or the "Northern Impressionists." The group contained renowned artists such as Edward E. Anderson, Joseph R. Bagshawe, Thomas Barrett and James W. Booth and was inspired by other impressionists such as Monet, Cezanne and Renoir. Dame Laura Knight became the most famous member of the Staithes Group; she and her husband and fellow painter Harold Knight kept a studio in the village.

Links to Captain James Cook

In 1745-1746, Staithes's most famous resident, James Cook (born in Marton near Middlesbrough), worked in Staithes as a grocer's apprentice where he first gained his passion for the sea. He moved to nearby Whitby where he joined the Royal Navy. William Sanderson's shop, where Cook worked, was destroyed by the sea, but parts were recovered and incorporated into "Captain Cook's Cottage". This has been the residency of a local Staithes family for several generations.

See also

Staithes railway station

External links

• Staithes Town Web Site
• The Haunting of Staithes Bay
• Staithes at the Open Directory Project.