Redcar

Redcar
Redcar Sea Front in 2005
Population	36,610 [1]
OS grid reference	NZ601252
• London	218 SSE
Unitary authority	Redcar and Cleveland
Ceremonial county	North Yorkshire
Region	North East
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	REDCAR
Dialling code	01642
Police	Cleveland
Fire	Cleveland
Ambulance	North East
UK Parliament	Redcar

Redcar is a seaside resort in the North East of England, and the principal town in the unitary authority of Redcar and Cleveland in the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire. It lies 7.5 miles (12.1 km) east-northeast of Middlesbrough by the North Sea coast. The combined population of the wards of Coatham, Dormanstown, Kirkleatham, Newcomen, West Dyke and Zetland was 36,610 in the 2001 census.

Redcar originated as a fishing town in the early 14th century, trading with the larger adjacent market town of Coatham. Until the mid 19th century it was a sub-parish of the village of Marske-by-the-Sea, when Redcar emerged as a seaside tourist destination. With the opening of the Middlesbrough to Redcar Railway in 1846, Redcar became a resort for Victorian tourists.

History

Redcar means "(place by the) red marsh" from the Old English rēad "red" and Old Scandinavian kjarr. However the first part of the name could also represent OE hrēod, (reed), giving a sense "reedy marshland", referring to the low lying land by the sea on which Redcar lies. Redcar originated as a fishing town in the 1300s, trading with the larger adjacent market town of Coatham. Until the mid 19th century it was a sub-parish of the local village of Marske-by-the-Sea (mentioned in the Domesday book).

In 1846 work was complete on the Middlesbrough and Redcar Railway, created to attract local tourism and trade, but like much of the Middlesbrough region, Redcar's real population expansion began with the discovery in 1850 of iron ore in the Eston area of the Cleveland Hills. With the construction of Redcar Racecourse in 1875, Redcar prospered as a seaside town drawing tourists to its eight miles of sands that lead on to Saltburn-by-the-Sea.

Zetland lifeboat

Main article: Zetland Lifeboat

Redcar is the home of the world's oldest surviving lifeboat, the Zetland, housed in a sea front museum operated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI).

Redcar and Coatham piers

Plans for Redcar Pier were drawn up in 1866, but work was not started until 1871 by which time building a pier at Coatham had been suggested. Misfortune struck both piers very early in their lives. Coatham Pier was wrecked before it could be completed when two sailing ships were driven through it in a storm. It had to be shortened because of the cost of repairs and was re-opened with an entrance with two kiosks and a roller-skating rink on the Redcar side, and a bandstand halfway down the pier. In October 1898 the barque Birger almost completely wrecked the pier and the pier was allowed to disintegrate. A glass house for concerts was added to the remains of the pier. In 1928 this was replaced by the New Pavilion theatre which became the Regent cinema in the early 1960s. An anchor from the Birger can be seen on the sea front pavement opposite the Zetland lifeboat museum.

Disaster struck Redcar Pier in the 1880s and 1890s when a series of ships broke through it. In October 1880 the brig Luna did £1,000 worth of damage and on New Year's Eve in 1885, SS Cochrane demolished the landing stage. In 1897 the schooner Amarant went through the pier and in the following year the pier head burnt down. In 1907 a pavilion ballroom was built on the pier behind the entrance kiosks and in 1928 the pavilion was extended. The pavilion continued in use after the Second World War despite the deliberate breaching (sectioning) of the pier (to prevent it being used by enemy invasion forces) and structural weakening caused by a nearby mine explosion. Damage to the pier by subsequent storms finally led to its demolition in 1981.

Governance

Historically a part of the North Riding of Yorkshire, in 1968 the town became part of the County Borough of Teesside, which was absorbed by the non-metropolitan County of Cleveland in 1974.

Redcar is now situated in the unitary authority of Redcar & Cleveland. It is ceremonially in North Yorkshire, but is within the region of North East England.

Politically, Redcar has tended to lean towards the Labour Party in parliamentary elections, allowing the town to fall under the category of an ultra-safe seat. From 1987 to 2001, the local MP was the late Mo Mowlam, and since 2001 the local MP has been Vera Baird.

The town comprises 4 wards: Coatham, Newcomen, West Dyke and Zetland. In addition, the suburbs of Dormanstown and Kirkleatham are two wards.

Councillors

On 3 May 2007, Redcar elected its councillors to Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council.

Ward		Councillor	Party
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |	Coatham	Josie Crawford	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |		Irene Curr	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |	Newcomen	Christopher Abbot	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |		Glynis Abbot	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |	West Dyke	Joyce Benbow	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |		Michael Carling	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Liberal Democrats/meta/color" |		Mary Ovens	Lib Dem
style="background-color: Template:Labour Party (UK)/meta/color" |	Zetland	Norma Hensby	Labour
style="background-color: Template:Conservative Party (UK)/meta/color" |		Robert Stanway	Conservative

Geography

Today Redcar is made up of numerous areas, including Coatham, Warrenby, Dormanstown, Lakes Estate, Redcar East, The Ings, Ings Farm, Mickledales and Westfield.

Economy

Main article: Teesside Steelworks

Redcar Steelworks at night

The town's main employer was the nearby Teesside Steelworks at Warrenby founded by Dorman Long in 1917 and the ICI Wilton chemical works of the post-war era. The steel produced at Dorman Long was used to build the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Tyne Bridge, Auckland Harbour Bridge and many others. Today steel is made further west at the Corus BOS plant in Lackenby, using iron produced at the company's Redcar blast furnace, the largest in Europe. Both sites became part of Tata Steel when Corus was taken over in 2007, but as of February 2008, they still trade under the Corus name. However, these operations are currently threatened.

The main pedestrianised shopping area is based on and around High Street and runs parallel to the sea front Esplanade.

There is a small inshore fishing fleet in Redcar catching lobster, crab and fish, and offering fishing trips to tourists. As high tide at Redcar now comes up to the sea wall, fishing cobles are permitted to park up with their trailers on a broad section of sea front pavement.

Tourism, leisure and amenities

Since the opening of the Middlesbrough to Redcar Railway in 1846 Redcar became a regular destination for the Victorian tourist. Every year people from North Yorkshire, Leeds and Scotland would come to Redcar for their holidays.

From the 1800s to the present day Redcar has had its donkey rides, owned for over a hundred years by the Burniston family, who also diversified as antique and jewellery dealers, scrap metal merchants, car bodyshop owners, garage owners, woolshops and also ran several other businesses in the town: the family still own the donkey rides to this day. In the 1970s there was also trampolining on the beach; the roundabouts and swings were run by Showman Victor Vernon and his family who like the Burnistons still have rides on the prom at present. Ice cream was sold on the promenade and a candy floss stall on the beach was also owned by the Burnistons. The ice cream was sold by Pacitto's, Rea's (part of the family of songwriter Chris Rea) and Kings - from 1946 - who also made and sold Redcar Rock. Pacitto's are still in Redcar on the sea front selling ice cream with red sauce and their signature cone, the lemon top (dairy ice cream in a cone, with a blob of lemon sorbet on top of it). The name "Pacittos" was derived from the name of an Italian family, who owned the shop in Redcar, and another member of the family owned the shop in Scarbrough. There was another ice crema company - with the family name "Todisco" that sold ice cream in the area, and was also very popular. Unfortunately, Mr. Todisco was one of the numerous Italians in the area sent to Canada during the war. His ship was hit by a German torpedo, and Mr. Todisco drowned consiquently. This was a great shock to the locals of Redcar, as, even though he may have been from a country that the British declared war against, Mr. Todisco was a good man.

Redcar Beach

The sand beach at Redcar stretches eight miles approximately south east and north west. In the north west the beach runs past Coatham to South Gare breakwater at the mouth of the river Tees. To the south east the sand beach is bordered by the Stray from Redcar's Zetland Park to Marske-by-the-Sea and then continues on to Saltburn. The Stray is a 2-mile (3 km) long public open strip of coastal grassland situated between the beach and the A1085 characterized by a series of howles (small chines) leading from the grassland to the beach. The Redcar coastline is a prime location for finding fossils of Gryphaea, also known as devil's toenails.

Redcar has had several parks built for tourism. These parks are Titty-Bottle Park, Coatham Enclosure, Locke Park, Zetland Park, Lily Park, and Amusement Park with its roller coaster. These parks employed hundreds of local people and are now operated by Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council. Today Titty-Bottle Park no longer exists as such and in its place on the triangular plot of land is a red and blue, brick built toilet block and tourist information centre, (see right of 'Redcar sea front' photograph). Amusement arcades have been at Redcar since the building of the Redcar Pier in 1873, and today the arcades are still very much part of Redcar sea front life. The town is only about 5.5 miles (9 km) away from the North York Moors National Park at its closest point, near Guisborough.

During filming of the adaptation of the Ian McEwan novel Atonement, Redcar experienced a sharp (approximate) 70% increase in the number of tourists who visited the town's promenade to see the film being shot. Redcar is also tipped to experience additional tourist numbers, thanks to Atonement's release into the cinemas and the film's expected popularity. This story has been highlighted in national and regional news.

Nightlife

As a seaside town, Redcar has long boasted a number of bars and nightclubs, and quite recently (as of 2006) three new venues have appeared on the High Street; the upmarket Blue Lounge (now re-named Aspire) and Martha's Vineyard, and the South African-themed Barracuda (Which reopened in October 2008 as The Livery), Elgins, which is situated in the centre of the busy high street offers Cheesy Chart music on Friday nights and House on a Saturday with DJ Sparky, resident for nine years, Thursdays and Sundays offering karaoke, with a live band night every Tuesday, although 8 years old the Plimsoll Line is still most notably the busiest and most popular bar amongst locals mainly due to its cheap price policy.

The seafront is home to some of Redcar's more established haunts, including Silks (now under new management), Aruba (formerly Kudos/The Piper - which reopened in 2007), The Deck (formerly Top Deck), and Angels, a decidedly more "adult" venue.

on Milbank terrace there is Harrys offering live music on Fridays and Saturdays

Landmarks

The Clock Tower

There are some twenty three listed buildings in Redcar.

• At the west end of High Street is a Grade II listed clock tower, a memorial to King Edward VII who was a regular visitor to Redcar. This tower has now been refurbished.
• On the seafront stands the grand Victorian edifice of the former Coatham Hotel. The ballroom of the hotel was the home to the Redcar Jazz Club a popular venue for the up-and-coming bands of the late 1960s and early 1970s.
• On the sea front is the grade II listed Zetland Lifeboat Museum operated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) housing the Zetland Lifeboat, the world's oldest surviving lifeboat.
• In the east of Redcar is a sound mirror. This is a grade II listed building built during the First World War as part of a regional defence system to detect approaching aircraft (Zeppelins mainly) and give early warning. Built in 1916 the mirror was used up until the invention of radar. Although it was originally built on open fields, a modern housing estate now surrounds it.

Transport

Redcar has three railway stations, on the Tees Valley Line and served by Northern Rail. From west to east they are: British Steel Redcar, with a very limited service for British Steel workers; Redcar Central serving the town centre and Redcar East about a mile to the south east which serves the residential area (unofficially) named after the station. There has been speculation locally about the development of a new station serving the expanding residential area known as The Ings, which would supposedly be situated between Redcar East railway station and Longbeck railway station in Marske-by-the-Sea, but so far no firm plans have been agreed.

On weekdays, trains run approximately every half hour in each direction, towards Saltburn eastbound and Middlesbrough, Darlington and Bishop Auckland westbound. There are also a couple of early morning through trains to Newcastle-upon-Tyne which run via Darlington and on to the East Coast Main Line via Durham and Chester-le-Street. Trains are less frequent on evenings and weekends.

The main roads through the town are the A1085 and the A174. Redcar is served primarily by Arriva North East buses, connecting Redcar with surrounding towns and villages such as Middlesbrough, Guisborough, Eston, Marske-by-the-Sea, New Marske and Saltburn.

The Pangea North and CANTAT-3 submarine telecommunication cables both come ashore at Redcar.

Education

The town's sixth form college is Redcar & Cleveland College. The town's secondary schools are: Redcar Community College (formerly West Redcar School), Sacred Heart RC Secondary School and Rye Hills School. There are eight primary schools in Redcar.

Sport

Main article: Redcar Bears

Redcar has a Motorcycle speedway racing team. The Redcar Bears racing in the Premier League. Although the track is at the South Tees Motorsport Park in Southbank Street it is unusual in that one bend is highly banked the other has much lower banking. The team is captained by 1992 World Champion Gary Havelock and managed by his father Brian. A junior team known as the Cubs also race in the Conference League.

Notable people

Nathaniel Hawthorne, the well-known American novelist, came to Redcar on 26 July 1859 in search of peace and quiet, while he worked on the manuscript of The Marble Faun. Hawthorne's house stands at the junction of High Street and King Street. This was formerly known as the Hawthorne Cafe. John MacDonald the international travel writer was born in the Dormanstown area of Redcar. Alfred Edward Graham (1882-1945), most active of Redcar's photographers, whose surviving negatives were fortunately acquired by Redcar Urban District Council's Library and Museum Committee and are now held by Redcar and Cleveland Museum Service. Film and television actresses June Laverick, and Wendy Hall, and actor/director/producer Robert Porter were all born in Redcar.

Gertrude Bell, colonial administrator and colleague of Lawrence of Arabia spent her youthful years at Red Barns, now the Red Barnes (sic) hotel in adjoining Coatham. Rex Hunt, governor of the Falkland Islands during the 1982 invasion by Argentina, attended Coatham School. The late Minister for Northern Ireland, Mo Mowlam, represented Redcar in the House of Commons.

Singer David Coverdale, lead singer with Deep Purple and Whitesnake lived there as a youth and worked in the Gentry clothes shop on Coatham Road. Chris Norman, founder member and former lead singer of Smokie was born in Redcar. Pete York, drummer with the Spencer Davis Group and session drummer was born in Redcar.

Robbie Stockdale, ex Middlesbrough FC and now Grimsby Town F.C footballer was born in Redcar and David Wheater, Middlesbrough FC and England national football team central defender, grew up and still lives in Redcar. Paralympian Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, originally from Wales, has lived in Redcar with her husband and daughter for the last few years.

Also see the category People from Redcar.

Cultural references

Atonement

In 2006, Redcar was used as a location for the film adaptation of the Ian McEwan novel Atonement. The Coatham Hotel, Regent Cinema, a section of Newcomen Terrace and part of the beach were dressed as 1940s Dunkirk. Filming took place across three days in August 2006, with local men playing the soldiers.

References

1. ^ Combined population of the wards of Zetland, Kirkleatham, Coatham, Dormanstown, West Dyke and Newcomen in 2001 Census.

External links

• Redcar at Curlie
• A Redcar local history site
• Redcar Decline Pictures showing the decay and demise of the town
• A North East history site
• Changing Redcar - site of 2001-6
• Atonement images
• John MacDonald's website
• Tides at the River Tees entrance on the BBC, Easytide and at Redcar & Cleveland Leisure website.