page_title: Jaywick
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Jaywick / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Typical street layout in Jaywick
context_page_description: Jaywick is a coastal village in the Tendring district of Essex, England, 2 miles west of Clacton-on-Sea. It lies on the North Sea coast of England, 60 miles from London and 17 miles from Colchester. It was constructed in the 1930s as a holiday resort for Londoners, but over time has become one of the most deprived areas in the country.
  The land on which the village is built was originally fields and salt marsh and unsuitable for agriculture. It was purchased by the entrepreneur Frank Stedman in 1928 to build low cost, affordable holiday homes for working-class families, and became a popular holiday destination throughout the 1930s. After the Second World War, a shortage of housing meant the properties became permanently inhabited despite not being built for this purpose. Many holiday homes are now in a state of disrepair, and the local community have resisted demolition. Jaywick has significant problems with unemployment and is at risk of flooding, despite several attempts by the local council to transform the area.
context_section_description: What is now Jaywick was originally fields and salt marshes near Clacton and St Osyth. The name, which was first recorded in 1438 in the form Clakyngewyk, means "dwelling associated with a man named *Clacc". The first element was later dropped, giving at first Gey wyck (1584) and eventually the modern form. A wooden spear from the Lower Paleolithic era, found locally in an area of foreshore erosion, is the oldest known man-made wooden artefact found in the British Isles. During the 19th century, the area was popular for shooting and contained a rifle range.
  Because of its close proximity to the sea, Jaywick had never been a practical place for farming due to the risk from floods; and the land remained unused. A sea wall was built in 1880 to protect against flooding. Ordnance Survey mapping around 1897 shows Jaywick as a few farmhouses near what is now Crossways on the Tudor estate.
  By the turn of the 20th century, campaigners such as William Morris had attempted to convince people of the virtues of self-sufficient communities for poor families away from large cities, which led to developments such as Peacehaven in Sussex in 1914. Jaywick was proposed by property developer Frank Stedman in 1928 as a cheap holiday retreat for Londoners. Stedman had noticed the popularity of Clacton as a holiday resort and believed that he could sell small plots of land to East End residents on which holiday homes could be built. Residents were encouraged to buy land and self-build properties, with plots being offered as little as £25 (equivalent to £1,500 in 2019), while Stedman convinced buyers that a house could be built for as little as £395 (equivalent to £24,000 in 2019). An initial emphasis was on well-being, health and fitness, with outdoor exercises being popular. However, Stedman was motivated primarily by money rather than altruism, and while he discussed plans for landscaping the development, along with a lake and a sports centre, these never materialised.
  The original estate was developed in the shape of a car radiator grille, with the roads named after various vehicle manufacturers. Coaches regularly picked up holidaymakers throughout the 1930s from Ilford and Romford. The Jaywick Miniature Railway, an 18-inch (460 mm) gauge miniature railway operated in Jaywick from 1936 to 1939. The locomotive was a model of a GNR Stirling 4-2-2.
  Plotland development elsewhere in Britain was bulldozed following the Second World War, and various attempts were made by the local council to demolish Jaywick, but there was resistance from residents, who campaigned against this and won a preservation order in 1970. The council were unhappy about a housing development sitting on such a flood-prone site, and modern conveniences were slow in arriving. A mains sewer system was only installed in 1977.
  In 1978, the local council issued an "Article 4 Direction" to control housing development in Jaywick. Under this direction, planning permission is required for home improvements that would not normally be needed elsewhere, including all extensions, porches and garden structures. The direction was further revised in 2010.
  In the 1990s, forty prefabricated houses were built on adjacent land on a former holiday camp to rehouse residents of some of the most dilapidated properties. Despite winning several architectural awards and being praised by the local council, only five of the older properties were demolished. The original development along Brooklands has faced demolition, particularly with respect to dilapidated properties, and vacant sites nearby have been purchased to provide new homes. New permanent residences in Brooklands are prohibited by council regulations. Tendring District Council hope that by 2026, the area will change sufficiently to be attractive for development, and to provide a self-sufficient service based economy for tourism.
caption: A typical street in Jaywick in 2009
exif: {"Image Make": "Sony Ericsson", "Image Model": "K850i", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "R1EA031     prg12004394_VODAFONE_SO 00.00", "Image DateTime": "2009:06:24 09:48:27", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "134", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "13388", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4513", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1000", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "64", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2009:06:24 09:48:26", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2009:06:24 09:48:27", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "259/50", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2592", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1944", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "416", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}