Welcome to Earby Council Website
Earby is a small town in the North of England. Traditionally a part of the great historic County of Yorkshire, as exemplified by the decorative white roses to be seen in many house windows, Earby now comprises part of the West Craven district of Lancashire. Thus the red rose symbol of the latter is shown entwined with the white rose of York in for example the local paper.
Historically Earby when a village was little more than a scattering of farms and a few handloom weavers cottages. It was part of Pennine England with its sturdy independent Yeoman Farmers famous for their thrift and canny silence, making a precarious living mainly from sheep but also dairy cattle.
The Leeds Liverpool Canal in the 18thC and then the Lancashire Yorkshire Railway in the 19thC brought great changes. At first woollen mills developed and then with the great heyday of King Cotton specialist cotton mills came to Earby. The population increased and the town took on the characteristics of a typical textile town, albeit a small one. Streets of workers’ two up two down cottages with back yard privvy. Gaslights, mill sirens, cobbles, non conformist chapels.
Like many of these small towns civic pride grew with the status of becoming an Urban District Council in 1909. A small town hall, a library, a post office, a Board School ( it already had a Grammar School), a park, a cinema, a dance hall and later a museum.
The Yorkshire Dales Lead Mining Museum is one of the glories of Earby and well worth a visit. Earby can also boast a YHA still and very apt too as Earby is on the famous long distance walk The Pennine Way.
The 20thC brought great changes. Prosperity came in fits and starts. Two world wars took its toll on the menfolk, as shown by the Memorial in Sough Park. Still Earby was dominated by the mills and the power of trade. Slowly the world changed and with it Earby. The mills began to close. Earby in 1974 became part of the Lancashire local authority called Pendle. Urban District status ended. People began to have to travel to ‘faraway’ places such as Gargrave or Burnley to find employment. The last mill shut its doors not very long ago. The cinema and dance hall were long gone. Many shops closed down.The future of Earby looked bleak. A group of ordinary local people with an extraordinary vision came together. They petitioned successfully to become a Parish Council. Years of dedication are paying off at last. Earby is on the rise again. The road to becoming a town council beckons. May we never forget those pioneers who have made this possible.
