Saltburn Pier

We were walking along the seafront at Saltburn and suddenly a pier appeared! It was the first pier on the north east coast and is now the last remaining pier in Yorkshire. For me was reminiscent of picture postcard holidays from a bygone era and stories that older people tell of being bairns at the beach.

The advent of the Stockton and Darlington Railway saw day trippers and holiday revellers arrive in their droves. The town swelled on the profits of tourism. A new hotel, The Alexandra was built. A sewerage system was designed. All mod cons to accommodate a growing interest in the local sea air and swanning about. The brains behind bringing in the crowds was engineer of all of the above in addition to the Saltburn Pier, John Anderson.

Emulating the designs at Margate, Anderson conjured a bobby dazzler of a pier, which consisted of a metal frame and wooden deck. It opened in 1869 having taken a little over a year to construct. At 1,500ft long, it had a landing stage at the head of the pier alongside two circular kiosks for steamers to dock along side. Passengers would travel in style to Middlesborough, and in the first six months over 50,000 people took to the sea for pleasure from the pier at Saltburn.

However, it was a challenge for bustle-bestowed ladies in the Victorian era to traverse the steep hill down to the sea, so Anderson was tasked with designing a cliff lift to accommodate.

Fast forward a little over 150 years, and the summer sunshine had throngs of Saltburnians sunburning on the sand. Wending our way through Shove Ha'penny, garish soft toy grabbers and lurid whizzing slot machines, red cherries whirling skywards in an accompaniment of Shania Twain “That doawwwwn impresssse me much”, we made our way past the prize bar to the quiet and cool air of the pier.

It was relatively quiet in comparison to the thrum of holidaygoers in the late 1800s. A few fishermen angling off the pier were casting their lines towards Teeside's sea sturdy wind turbines. And looking back, people paddled in the surf with a backdrop of kaleidoscopic beach huts.

In 1873, the pier would see a swarm of jostling day trippers, eager to board paddle steamers bound for Hartlepool and Scarborough. The pennies rolled in and the shareholders lined their pockets! However, two years later in the autumn of 1875, a horrific storm hit the north east coast, with winds and waves eating up and spitting out 300 feet of the pier. Significant damage was done to the landing stage, pier head and part of the deck and amidst a slump in the iron trade, the decision was taken not to replace the full pier, but to decrease its length.

The repairs took their toll on the Saltburn Pier Company and rising steel costs saw them falling into debt and by 1880, it was all over as the company was sold at the same hotel built by Alexander just seventeen years earlier. The pier went under the hammer for a mere £800.

Scooped up by the Middlesborough Estate, the pier was catapulted into its heyday. They kicked the cliff lift into touch and had it overhauled to improve access to the pier. Jazzy gas lights were added to the newly widened walkway alongside a saloon, refreshment rooms, a bandstand and a newly designed entrance booth to match the blood and custard livery of the cliff lift!

A series of small pier problems ensued in the early 1900s; a second storm caused minor damage, and the SS Ovenbeg caused more major damage when it careered into the pier in 1924 causing a second slice of 210 feet of the walkway to fall into the sea and render the bandstand inaccessible.

Five years later repairs were carried out and the pier was reopened with a new theatre present on the landside.

Walking along it's nice to think of the thousands of feet over 155 years sauntering seawards who'd have been filled with exhilaration, taking in the sea air and the notion of taking to the waves to sunny Scarborough.

Today there are no signs of its turbulent past, but during the second world war, the pier was commandeered by the Royal Engineers who used it to guard against Nazi invasion. It would be the 1950s until the pier reappeared when 25,000 visitors flocked in the month of May. However, the fun was short-lived as a series of storms buffeted the boards throughout the 1950s and 1970s causing thousands of pounds of damage over the years.

By 1975, the pier was in a sorry state and was threatened with closure. People campaigned vociferously and the council intercepted in the late 70s after a public enquiry. Clinging on by its cast iron trestles, the National Lottery awarded £1.2 million to restore and upgrade the pier's original features.

In 2009, The National Piers Society awarded the hugged-up and glued-together pier at Saltburn Pier of The Year. There was an official switch on of the under pier lights in 2019, 150 years after the opening of the pier which gave it a literal glow up.

On this warm and windless day in June, it was astonishing to think of the turbulent life and times of Saltburn Pier, but pleasing to walk with others, enjoying the blue of the sky and the life in the landscape around us. Fingers crossed the storms of the future stay at bay and the pier brings pleasure for people for many years to come.

If you're in Saltburn by the Sea and are looking for other lovely places to visit, you'll have been hard pushed not to have noticed Saltburn Cliff Tramway. You could also check out The Charm Bracelet on the Cleveland Way or the fascinatingly named Huntcliff Guibal Fan House.