Not just a market town

Pickering is described as the gateway to the North Yorkshire Moors and is a thriving market town with many features and customs.

Above it are the rolling moors and below is the wide vale which was in prehistoric times a huge lake.

The red roofed town has grown old graciously and the narrow winding streets give it an old-fashioned air.

Monday is market day when the town centre is busy with open air stalls and farmers come in from the nearby dales and moors to buy and sell and meet their friends.

Pubs like the Black Swan Inn, White Swan Inn or the Forest and Vale are busy on market days.

At the bottom of the gently sloping market place, once the village green, is the terminus of the North York Moors Railway.

The huge parish church of St Peter and St Paul which overlooks the market place has a unique gallery of 15th century paintings on the wall which were discovered in 1851, only to be whitewashed over by the vicar who thought they would encourage idolatry.

They were rediscovered in 1878 and uncovered to reveal scenes from the Bible, from history and from legend.

In Pickering church are memorials to Robert and Nicholas King, local men who carried out surveys in America and helped plan Washington USA.

Not far away is the Kirk Theatre, once a Methodist chapel but now hosting concerts and plays.

One of the men Pickering remembers was Francis Nicholson who won fame as an artist and is known as the Father of English Water Colour Painting. He was born here in 1753 and died in 1844.

Other notable men of the town were Ralph Dodwer, who left to make a fortune in London and became Lord Mayor in 1521.

James Calvert went out to take the Gospel to Fiji while John Costillo, a poet, wrote dialect poems and his gravestone is in the Methodist graveyard.

The Beck Isle Museum of Rural Life fills 17 rooms in the former home of William Marshall, founder of England’s first agricultural college. Exhibits span 200 years of rural life including a cottage kitchen, cobbler’s shop, dairy, barber’s and even a Victorian pub bar.

Beckside Crafts Centre is close to the museum and is where local craftsmen and women display their work.