History of Shanklin

and restaurants and pubs, and a large, clean beach. Shanklin used to have a pier, but this was destroyed in the Great Storm of 1987. The pier formerly had a theatre at which many famous performers appeared, including Paul Robeson, Richard Tauber and Arthur Askey (whose daughter attended a local boarding school called Upper Chine School for Girls). The Summerland Amusement Arcade on the seafront was formerly a seaplane hangar positioned at Bembridge where it housed Fairey Campania seaplanes of the Nizam of Hyderabad's Squadron. Much of the seafront was cleared in World War Two bombing.

Shanklin Sailing Club is situated at the North end of the Esplanade. Founded in 1931 as 'Shanklin Amateur Sailing Club', the club has a fleet of Sprint 15 catamarans and holds races three days a week during the season.

Further along the beach is the Fisherman's Cottage pub. This is at the bottom of Shanklin Chine, from which the town takes its name, historically "Chynklyng Chine" and in the Domesday Book of 1086 Sencliz (held by William FitzAzor; Jocelyn FitzAzor) from "Scen-hlinc". The Chine is open to the public for a small fee and continues up to Rylstone Gardens in the Old Village. It contains a small section of the pipe of the "Operation Pluto" pipeline which ran across the Isle of Wight and out from Shanklin and another branch from Sandown to supply fuel to the D-Day beaches