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Settle
The Town Hall, Settle, Yorkshire - geograph.org.uk - 430227.jpg
Settle Town Hall
Settle is located in North Yorkshire
Settle
Settle
Population 2,564 (2011 census)
OS grid reference SD816640
• London 200 mi (320 km) SE .
Civil parish
  • Settle
District
  • Craven
Shire county
Region
Country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town SETTLE
Postcode district BD24
Dialling code 01729
Police North Yorkshire
Fire North Yorkshire
Ambulance Yorkshire
EU Parliament Yorkshire and the Humber
UK Parliament
  • Skipton & Ripon
Website http://www.visitsettle.co.uk/
List of places
UK
England
Yorkshire
54°04′05″N 2°16′48″W / 54.068°N 2.280°W / 54.068; -2.280

Settle is a market town and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England. Historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is served by Settle railway station located near the town centre, and Giggleswick railway station which is a mile away. It is 29 miles (47 km) from Leeds Bradford Airport. The main road through Settle is the B6480, which links to the A65, connecting Settle to Leeds, Ilkley, Skipton and Kendal. The town had a population of 2,421 according to the 2001 Census increasing to 2,564 at the 2011 Census.

History

Settle is thought to have 7th century Anglian origins, its name being the Angle word for settlement. Craven in the Domesday Book shows that until 1066 Bo was the lord of Settle but after the Harrying of the North (1069–1071) the land was granted to Roger de Poitou.

In 1249 a market charter was granted to Henry de Percy, 7th feudal baron of Topcliffe by Henry III. A market square developed and the main route through the medieval town was aligned on an east-west direction, from Albert Hill, Victoria Street, High Street and Cheapside and on through Kirkgate. This road led to Giggleswick where the citizens attended the parish church. The first bridge over the River Ribble was mentioned in 1498.

During the English Civil War, the Cliffords, the lords of the manor were Royalists, but their subjects were not. John Lambert of Calton in Malhamdale, was a general in Cromwell's army and his troops camped at Settle in August 1651 while on the road to an encounter in Lancaster.

Geography

View of Settle from Castlebergh
View from Castlebergh

Settle was part of the West Riding of Yorkshire. It is located in Ribblesdale, at the southern edge of the Yorkshire Dales, within a few miles of the Three Peaks. Immediately overlooking the town is Castlebergh, a 300 feet (91 m) limestone crag, and to the east is Malham which was in the former Settle Rural District. The River Ribble provided power for Settle's former cotton mills, and is now being harnessed by Settle Hydro, a micro hydroelectric scheme, to provide 50 kW of power to the National Grid.

Tourism

Settle's market is held weekly on Tuesdays in Victoria Hall in the town centre. Settle Town Hall was sold by Craven District Council to a developer. The Square is surrounded by local businesses, most of which are family-owned, with some offering items for sale unique to the Settle area. The Naked Man is believed to be the oldest cafe in the country.

The Settle Stories Festival brings internationally known and award winning artists to the town and boasts a range of paid for and free events suitable for all age ranges. The festival attracts visitors from around the world and audiences have more trebled in size since the first festival in 2010. In 2014 the festival was praised as one of the top 5 festivals in Yorkshire by the State of the Arts, one of the top 5 storytelling festivals to 'watch out for' by international magazine Newsweek and Settle's main event by Welcome to Yorkshire. The next festival was to run from 1 to 3 April 2016. The Settle Stories Festival is produced by Settle Stories an arts and heritage charity based in Settle Town Hall. Settle Stories also run a learning programme and the W.R. Mitchelle Archive.

The Folly is a 17th-century Grade I listed building on the main street. In 1996 the North Craven Building Preservation Trust purchased part of the Folly, restored it and opened it to the public in 2001. The Folly houses the Museum of North Craven Life and hosts exhibitions during the open season. There are permanent displays, including the Settle to Carlisle Railway, Robert (Mouseman) Thompson furniture and local history. The rest of building has been purchased by the trust. The museum is independent and run by volunteers.

The Gallery on the Green is thought to be the smallest art gallery in the world: drawings, paintings, photographs and other works are housed in a former BT telephone kiosk. Gavagan Arts at Linton Court Gallery is situated in a courtyard off Duke Street. The gallery presents a series of temporary exhibitions of modern and contemporary art.

The district has several caves where prehistoric remains have been found, the most notable being Victoria Cave, so called because the inner chamber was discovered in 1837 on the day of Queen Victoria's accession. The cave is a geological SSSI and scheduled monument. Victoria Cave contained fossil remains. The earliest, at 130,000 years old, include mammoth, straight-tusked elephant, cave bear and hippopotamus, Bos primigenius, Rhinoceros leptorhinus and spotted hyenas (as a bed of hyena bones). They date to an Upper Pleistocene interglacial. After the last Ice Age the cave was used by hibernating brown bear and reindeer. Associated with the later deposits were a harpoon head carved from antler; flint implements and other ornaments. The discovery of flint is noteworthy as it is not found naturally in the area. Craven Museum & Gallery in Skipton has an exhibition of items which includes a bear's skull found in one of the caves.

Cultural

The composer Edward Elgar visited Settle on many occasions to visit his friend Dr Charles William Buck. There is a blue plaque at Cravendale to commemorate this.

Education

Settle has two schools, with Settle Primary School and Settle College. Settle Middle School closed as part of the money-saving measures taken by North Yorkshire County Council. To the west of the town is Giggleswick School, one of the principal independent schools in the North of England, founded in 1512.

Infrastructure

Daniel Defoe wrote "Settle is the capital of an isolated little kingdom of its own surrounded by barren hills." Because of its remoteness Settle saw mostly local commerce. The old roads were pack horse trails and drovers' roads along hilltops because the valley was soft and swampy before field drainage and the dredging of stream estuaries.

In the 1700s textile industrialists supported by traders and landowners campaigned for a turnpike to connect with growing industrial towns. The minute book for the Keighley and Kendal Turnpike Trust shows that most investors were mill owners from the Giggleswick district. In 1827 the trust, having miscalculated the cost of road maintenance, was in debt by £34,000. When in 1877 the trust was terminated, the investors received on average 54% of their deposit. The investors had benefited in that Settle was now well connected and its cotton mills boomed. The mill owners imported coal and, like the heavy industries that exported agricultural lime and sandstone masonry, welcomed the turnpike for access via carrier waggons to the Leeds and Liverpool Canal at Gargrave. The first passenger stagecoach arrived in 1763. The Mail Coach was running regularly in 1786. The Union coach for passengers ran each way on alternate days in the early 1800s, and daily by 1840.

Railways

The "little" North Western Railway reached Giggleswick in 1847 and in 1849 the railway company constructed Station Road from Giggleswick to Settle. In 1875, the Settle to Carlisle Railway was built, opening to goods traffic in 1875 and to passengers the following year when Settle railway station opened along with a goods warehouse, cattle pens, signal box and water cranes.

In the late 18th-century cotton spinning became the town's main employment. Bridge End Mill was converted from corn milling to cotton spinning. John Procter operated mills at Runley and King's Mill which were taken over by his son Thomas. He built the row of workers' cottages, Procter's Row in Lower Kirkgate. In 1835, Dog Kennel Mill and Brennand's Weaving Shed, Settle had five mills employing 333 people.

Notable people

  • Richard Bache (1737–1811), merchant, American Postmaster General and son-in-law of Benjamin Franklin
  • George Birkbeck (1776–1841), founder of the Mechanics' Institutes; Birkbeck, University of London is named after him
  • Reverend Benjamin Waugh (20 February 1839 – 11 March 1908) founder of the NSPCC is also commemorated by a plaque on what is now the Neil Wright Estate Agents in Settle town square
  • George Howson (1860–1919), reforming headmaster
  • Francis Morphet Twisleton (1873–1917), military leader and letter writer
  • Theodore Rigg (1888–1972), agricultural chemist
  • Annice Sidwells (1902–2001), radio singer
  • Claire Brooks (1931 – 13 March 2008), lawyer and politician
  • Don Wilson (7 August 1937 – 21 July 2012), England and Yorkshire cricketer
  • Mike Harding (born 1944), singer and comedian
  • Emma Lonsdale (sportswoman – skiing) (born 1984), Winter Olympian 2014
  • John Newman (born 1990), soul singer
  • James Newman (born 1985), singer, songwriter and the representative for the United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 & 2021
  • Dr James Frederic Riley FRSE (1912–1985) radiologist and finder of the link between mast cells and asthma
  • Ann Harding — awarded British Empire Medal in the Queen's Birthday Honours for services to the community of Settle during COVID-19
  • James Brown guitarist from Pulled Apart by Horses attended Settle College

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Settle (Yorkshire del Norte) para niños

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