The Whitby Civic Society Society

Flither Pickers

Members of Whitby Civic Society and friends were delighted, on 16th March to welcome back a popular guest, local historian Margery Thomson,who vividly described the trials of life of flither pickers or women gatherers of bait for the male fishermen in the family.

Fishermen had a hard life but so did their wives and daughters, gathering shellfish and baiting hundreds of hooks in all sorts of weather. Sometimes hours of work gathering and baiting would be wasted if the men could not go to sea. Then hooks needed to be unbaited and the bait thrown away and a new round of gathering and baiting re-started. Every member of the family had to co-operate, working together for the welfare of the whole family.She illustrated the talk with archive quotations from former flither pickers and from novels. This helped to to bring the historic facts to life.

AGM Forum

The ideas suggested at the discussions following the AGM have been followed up at later meetings of the Executive committee. Geoff Wilson is leading those interested in special problems on the West Side. No one has yet been found to do the same for the East Side.

Footpaths

Geoff Wilson was doing a lot of work on establishing the rights of public paths in Whitby and around it. He had been invited and attended a meeting of Scarborough Council on this matter. He is especially trying to establish a recognised path from Whitby to Ruswarp close to the railway. The committee discussed the state of the beck next to the path through Factory Fields due to rubbish dumping. This needed more than the volunteers who did the beach cleans and it was suggested that the Moors and Coastal Volunteer group might be interested.

Planning

The planning application fo Raithwaite Hall Hotel was discussed and generally approved as Whitby needed a first class hotel but there was some misgivings about the entry and exit from the public road.

To return to the index

Whitby Civic Society cleans beaches
West Cliff beach had a beach clean on 19 February at 9.30 am with members of the society and a school party from Rotherham. There was another Beach Clean on 25th April at Tate Hill Beach 10 am.

Proposed new Blue Plaque

The first Admiral of the Australian navy, Sir William Clarkson, once lived in St Hilda's Terrace and the Society is considering erecting a blue plaque at his former home. We have many Australians visiting Whitby for its associations with Captain Cook and this will give them another link to their nation's history.

White Rabbit Trail

The Society's popular trail linking Whitby to Lewis Carroll's stays in Whitby has been updated and reprinted.

The Mayor's Volunteer'Awards

At the 'Mayor's Big Bash' in Scarborough Spa in March Susan and Nik Harty received a certificate on behalf of all the executive committee and other members who work so hard as volunteers in many ways for the benefit of the environment and the community.