The History of Staveley


The village of Staveley is five miles from the market town of Kendal and is in the Lake District National Park.
Staveley has a population of about 1600 people. The parishes are Hugill, Nether Staveley and Over Staveley. Each has it's own parish council and all were set up in 1894. The different parish boundaries are shown where the River Kent and River Gowan join.
In 1988 a bypass was completed around the village, taking the traffic away from the heart of the village.
The first people to live in Staveley were farmers of the late Stone age, this was in about 4000BC.

Staveley School


 Staveley Church of England Primary School started in the year 1755, to quote the sign in the Assembly Hall, "To make more useful the gift of 20 pounds a year left by George Jopson. This school was begun by subscription and finished in 1755. Risit Apollo" This last meaning "Apollo Smiles" in Latin. The provider for the new school, George Jopson, was well known in the village of Staveley and the Kentmere Valley. He knew the entire community's wishes and probably made a good guess at how his money would be used. The school when on reasonably well until 1840, when it was sold off and a new school built on the present site. The first ever professional teacher was called Joseph Martindale, who straightened things up a bit after a vicar from Kendal said of the school in 1860, "the school move was simply a horror, it has a low ceiling, square room which is too small for the number of children and is wretchedly furnished with a nasty stove in the middle of one wall".
The new teacher Joseph Martindale, was a very just and fair teacher, once he caned a boy for stealing some birds eggs from a nest. Now, in honour of him the new library is named after him.

This page was written on February 24th 1998 by Julia Marston.

The following text is written by Sam Houghton.


Staveley is a little village in between Kendal and Windermere. It is a quite a popular tourist destination due to its surroundings.

One of the most popular areas close by is Kentmere which is a perfect place for walking and mountain biking.

Also in Staveley there are several shops which sell all the essentials, there is even a bicycle shop!

Before 1989 the village was very busy due to the traffic going to and returning from the Lakes. But now a by-pass has been built and the village is a much safer place to play and walk because of the reduced amount of traffic. In the village there is a church called St. James, and a war memorial. Also there there is a primary school which has around 120 pupils, after you leave that school most pupils come to the Lakes School.


Lakes School Home page.