Seaside Traders at Westward Ho!

TV reporter Terry Fleet is in Westward Ho! near Bideford. The seaside traders are disappointed after the wet bank holiday weekend. Until 1971 the summer bank holiday was the first Monday in August and originally for bank employees. From 1965 until 1970 England, Wales and Northern Ireland trialled having the holiday on the last Monday in August and the Banking and Financial Dealings Act of 1971 made it law. Scotland retained the first Monday in August as the Bank Holiday.

The summers of 1962 and 1963 are on record as having had poor weather and the 62-63 winter was particularly harsh with extreme snowfall. In 1855 Charles Kingsley wrote a novel entitled Westward Ho! set in Bideford. It became a bestseller. The Earl of Portsmouth Isaac Newton Wallop helped form and chair in 1863 the Northam Burrows Hotel and Villa Building Company. The first buildings took the name of Westward Ho! and included the exclamation mark and thereafter the village grew and remains the only place in the UK to exclaim its name! The area still has many attractions and a two-mile sandy beach that backs onto Northam Burrows Country Park.