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Five pink posts and a village at war
Then in 1963 - John Hackett and his Dutch war time bride arrived in the small fishing village of Staithes with their nine children. John was an electrician at the nearby Skinningrove Steelworks and to help with the family budget they decided to turn their downstairs accomodation into a small tea room, appropriately named The Tulip Cafe after Rose’s Dutch origins.
It was hard work for Rose, but with the help of her elder children the cafe soon became popular with visitors frequenting this picturesque resort with its narrow twisting main street barely wide enough for cars to venture down the steep hill to the shore line. And herein was the problem facing the
Hacketts. Their cafe was located on a natural elbow in the street, and delivery vans and motorist would use their small forecourt to reverse their vehicles.
Two man hole covers belonging to the cafe were regularly, and expensively, cracked with these
maneurovers. At the same time motorcyclists were using the forecourt to park their bikes up aginst the cafe window, John Hackett decided enough was enough, and applied to the council for permission to put up five 18” free standing posts on the forecourt to protect his property. The council however decreed that the forecourt was common ground and turned down his application. Undeterred John took his case to the Highways Department, who surprisingly agreed to his proposal, much to the annoyance of the villagers. The following day the five posts in pink primer paint appeared on parade. It was a signal for war to be declared.
First into the fray was Mr Jim
Hamil, the owner of the nearby Copper Kettle cafe who demanded the posts be removed on the grounds that they were unsightly and a danger
tompedestrian.
“Posts stay” retorted an uncompromising John. “Right” said Jim. “In that case we will all have pink posts in front of our properties.” And storming off he quickly prepared a large poster for his shop window offering to supply pink posts to the villagers free of charge, and further more he would erect them in front of the houses lining the main street.
His offer was taken up with enthusiasm by the locals who had taken a strong dislike to John Hackett and his caverlier antics.
Now the national press and TV stations were alerted and descended on the village in great numbers. The feud intensified and turned ugly as Staithes was thrust into the national headlines. John Hacket’s water supply was tampered with and when he went to repair it he was attacked and kicked in the head. Now the poice were invloved and severe warnings were given to keep the peace otherwise arrests would follow.
Enter Albert Wilson a neighbour of Jim
Hamil. Together they set about establishing a line of pink posts in the High Street. Albert undertook the task of kneeling at Jim’s feet and steadying the 3ft posts while Jim wheelded a 60 pound sledge hammer above him. They were making good progress until the hammer head came off in mid-flight, and Albert was sent sprawling concussed into the gutter. The TV crews were estatic and the Staithes Pink Post drama became national headlines.
Now in 1999 - Rose Hackett, now 73 and living alone in Whitby recalled the emnity the saga created. “I’ll never forget the hostility and the dreadful atmosphere those daft five pink posts caused. We can never get away from the story and we will never live it down, and we will always be known as the five pink post family of Staithes”
Many of the posts were still there when the Hacketts finally moved to open a caravan site at the top of Staithes Bank. John Hackett, who subsequently left Rose, died some while ago.
This article originally appeared in the August 1999 issue of Now
& Then Magazine
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