Newton-on-Rawcliffe

The settlement is listed in the Domesday Book, and the name means new farm.{{cite web |title=Newton {{!}} Domesday Book |url=https://opendomesday.org/place/SE8190/newton/ |website=opendomesday.org |access-date=7 January 2025}}{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=A. H. |title=The Place Names of the North Riding of Yorkshire |date=1979|orig-date=1928|oclc= 19714705|publisher=English Place Name Society|page=84}} The village has a small pond in the village green, and houses on either side of the main road through the village alongside the green.{{cite book |last1=Rushton |first1=John |title=The Ryedale story: a Yorkshire countryside handbook |date=1986 |publisher=Ryedale District Council |location=Malton |page=127|oclc=62171506}}

The stone wheel village sign reads “Newton Upon Rawcliffe” facing Pickering on Yatts Road. The village is still locally known as "upon".

The Playing Field opposite the sign was born when two young lads at the Parish Meeting in 1998, called to consider possible millennium projects, requested a field to play in.  The one acre site was purchased in early in 2001 and was opened on the Queen's Jubilee day in 2002.  It contains a children's play park: all year tennis, netball, basketball on the multi-sport hard court, and permanent barbecue beside the picnic tables by the football pitch.

In 1870 the current St John's was consecrated and is part of nine Church of England churches within the [https://www.kmbchurches.co.uk/index.html Kirby Misperton & Middleton] parishes. Originally St John's church in Newton Upon Rawcliffe was part of the ancient Pickering Parish and during one period it had three places of worship. As buildings fell into disrepair and subsequently condemned, work started on the present site in 1866, and in 1870 our St John's Church was consecrated. Very little has altered over 150 years and it still remains a typical mid-Victorian country church with a church services on the first Sunday of the month, Easter and Christmas.

St John's church hosts the chiming village clock announcing the hour and half-hour and was donated in 1927 in memory of Edward Bell Raper, who is buried in the churchyard.  It is fitted with a six-legged gravity escapement, the mechanism goes all the way up the tower and uses the church bell to strike.  A millennium bench sits directly under the bell tower.

Seven Penny Garth allotments are situated just north of the church and vicarage on the east side of the village and within the National Park. Averaging approximately 14 by 35 metres for the use of the parishioners of Newton Upon Rawcliffe, the soil is sandy loam which is ideal for vegetable growing.

Opposite St John's Church of England site is the former Newton Methodist Chapel, closed around 2020 and is now a holiday home. Primitive Methodist magazine August 1853 pp. 496–497 states a new Methodist chapel was opened May 1853.  Land was given by J Young of Stape, J Watson of Pickering made the deeds and T Michelson gave the timber for the roof and sleepers. If everything had been paid for the cost would have been £100; the actual cost was £40. The chapel measured 27′ x 20.5′ and accommodated 100 people.   J Young and S Stephenson collected nearly half of the money.   The Foundation Stone of the Methodist chapel states it was laid in 1907.

The Methodist society first met in a cart shed belonging to Isaac Harland (?) in a room that was ”very damp, badly lighted and the road to it was through a farm yard.” William Harland who became Superintendent of the Scarborough circuit preached his first sermon there.   The former cart shed is now a private double fronted home close to the village hall, with steps up from the road leading to a double door.

[https://whiteswannewton.com The White Swan] pub, YO18 8QA was also known as The Mucky Duck, and marks the bus stop for the weekly 173 bus operated by Ryedale Community Transport,{{Cite web |title=Local Bus Services |url=https://ryedalect.org/our-services/local-bus-services/ |access-date=2025-05-29 |website=Ryedale Community Transport}} picking up Monday mid-morning, and returning Monday early afternoon, enabling villagers use of Pickering market.

The pub is directly opposite the upper village green duck pond. Another additional duck pond existed on the lower green until it was filled in during 1949.

There is another pond down the unsurfaced Keld Lane behind the houses. In April 2007, local villager Dennis explained to the local newspaper Gazette & Herald:{{Cite web |date=2007-04-25 |title=Newton-upon-Rawcliffe |url=https://www.gazetteherald.co.uk/news/1354193.newton-upon-rawcliffe/ |access-date=2025-05-29 |website=Gazette & Herald |language=en}} The pond had become derelict and filled with rubbish over many years and effectively dried out over summer so we embarked on a project to restore it. "We cleared it out and dug it out and refilled it, and built a bird hide to look at local wildlife which includes birds, foxes and badgers. It is a useful habitat for local wildlife."

A recessed classic ER VII red post box numbered YO18 107D-CP50 is in operation six days a week in the old post office, next to The White Swan pub. Post is collected at the same time that the village post is delivered in the morning.

Newton upon Rawcliffe's village hall wall houses the heart defibrillator,{{Cite web |title=Defib finder – find the defibrillators nearest you. |url=https://www.defibfinder.uk/ |access-date=2025-05-29 |website=www.defibfinder.uk}} and noticeboard.

The location of the original village school would have been the existing, building to the North, and adjacent, to St John's Church, this eventually became the Village Reading Room, which was replaced by the school at the top of the village which is now the Village Hall. The Reading Room was eventually sold and the money  invested and incorporated into a trust fund. The village school in opposite the upper duck pond closed in 1969 and it's now the village hall.{{Cite web |title=Newton upon Rawcliffe and Stape - Village Hall |url=https://www.newton-upon-rawcliffe.com/village-hall |access-date=2025-06-02 |website=www.newton-upon-rawcliffe.com |language=en-US}} There is no school in Newton Upon Rawcliffe.

An original fully working red telephone box stands close to the Village Hall with a reliable landline of 01751 473 291

The village road rises to the north, and next to a stone stating Newton Upon Rawcliffe sits a wooden and stone bench elevated on the top of the hill, with space for the walking signposts directing to an unpaved road listed on Google maps as E Brown Road, leading down the back of the village.

Over a stye fence, close to power cables sits the Evans cousin's memorial bench with clear views to the [https://visitnorthyorkshire.com/index/levisham-moor-and-hole-of-horcum-walk moorland opposite], Newtondale, and down to Levisham Station for the steam engine track on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. The path leads to Levisham Station in the valley, the town of Pickering, or back to the village via paths from behind The White Swan or St John's Church.

The carved wooden Evans cousin's memorial bench rests upon an enclosed stone plinth and remembers the cousins “Kenneth George Evans and Patrick Bryant Evans” who died serving in Egypt. Weathered engraving on the bench reads: "In Memory of Kenneth George Evans and Patrick Bryant Evans... Cousins who for many years as boys together enjoyed the freedom of these moors... Both were serving with ...The Royal Armoured Corps…Western desert Egypt…The former on about 15…The latter on 1 November …Were aged 21 years…"

Visible from the memorial bench is the ruined Skelton Tower offers an extraordinary view down into Newtondale and over the track of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. Built around 1830 by Robert Skelton, rector of Levisham, it was once used as overnight lodgings after a day's shooting on the grassy headland moors{{Cite web |date=2021-01-18 |title=Why Skelton Tower proved a double blessing for the rector who built it |url=https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/heritage-and-retro/heritage/why-skelton-tower-proved-a-double-blessing-for-the-rector-who-built-it-3103707 |access-date=2025-06-02 |website=Yorkshire Post |language=en}}.

Within the village and St John’s Church, Newton Upon Rawcliffe, are memorials to:

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Mounted on the church wall:

Roll of Honour , Newton-Upon-Rawcliffe, Names of the men from Newton Parish who served with the Colours in the Great War, 1914 - 1919. Written out by Robert L. Hart, York, January 1920.

Charles Allanson, Moses Allanson, John Botham, Tom Botham, John Brough, Albert Brown, Fred Brown, Bertie Eddon, Harold Eddon, Thomas Eddon, George William Estill, Harold Forth, Percy Forth, Charles Victor Greenfield, John Hill, Donald Holliday, Harry Holtby, [Newton] Harry Holtby, [Stape), Harry King, Charles Edward Leng, Arthur James Masterman, Reginald Masterman, Edward Milestone, Fred Milestone, Robert Milestone, Thomas William Mortimer, Bert Nichols, George William Nicols, Harold Nichols, George Robert Pearson, John William Pearson, John Francis Pennock, Robert Pickering, Thomas Pickering, William Jackson Potter, Fred Russell, Albert Sellars, Bertie Smith, John Thomas Smith, John William Smith, Percy Smith, William Smith, John Tolley, David Randolph Waind, Edmund Ward, John Watson, William Watson, Matthew William Woodmancey.

Wall Brass Plaque

Remember before God these men who served in the Great War (1914 - 1918), And gave their lives for liberty and right. Bombardier George William Estill, Private Thomas William Mortimer, Private John William Pearson, Private Robert Pickering, Private William Jackson Potter, Private John Thomas Smith, Gunner John Tolley, Private David Randolph Waind. “Their name liveth for evermore”, Erected by the parishioners of Newton.

Brass: Edward Bell Raper 1864 - 1925, Hilda Dilawar his wife 1878 - 1942 (spelling unclear)

Brass on communion rail: In memory of Bernard George Stenson Webb, Buried here February 1938

Brass on chair: GW Presented by The Reverend E.C.Tippetts Vicar On the silver jubilee of the Patron H.M.King George V “By me kings reign” - Proverbs 8.16

Brass by the recessed stone credence near the Holy Communion table: To the Glory of God and in pious memory of Sarah Ann Jackson. The floor of this Chancel was relaid, Credence built in and Altar presented by her husband the Reverend Frederick Jackson Vicar of this Paris All Saints Day 1895 RIP

Bench on the lower green: In loving memory of Leonard & Cynthia Allanson.

Tree on the lower green: In memory of Billy Garrett.

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Category:Villages in North Yorkshire