TRIBUTES have been paid to a local historian who was a longstanding fundraiser for the RNLI.

Vera Robinson MBE has died at the age of 101 after a short illness.

She had been raising funds for the Redcar RNLI lifeboat station since the age of 16 and was president of the Redcar Lifeboat Ladies Guild.

She began collecting funds for the lifeboats at Redcar in 1930 and attended her final ladies guild annual general meeting in May this year.

Dave Cocks from Redcar RNLI said: "It is a well-used cliché, but Vera really was one of a kind. When she started raising funds, the lifeboat at Redcar was oar-powered, and horses were used to launch the lifeboats. Sometimes, the womenfolk of the town would help to get the lifeboat into the sea.

"Vera saw so many changes in lifeboats during her time, and she always had the greatest of respect for the volunteers who crewed the lifeboats."

As well as raising two sons, David and George, Vera taught countless other children in her long teaching career which began in Marske and included Saltburn High School and Zetland Primary School, before she retired from Grangetown Junior School in 1974.

The grandmother and great-grandmother was awarded the MBE in 1972 by the Queen Mother at Buckingham Palace for services to education.

Mr Cocks added: "Generations of lifeboat volunteers have grown up in Redcar knowing Vera, either from school or from her fundraising efforts. Then in 2014 she became known world-wide through social media and received literally thousands of greetings for her 100th birthday.

"Everyone at the lifeboat station is saddened at her passing and we offer our sincere condolences to her family."

Mrs Robinson died in hospital in the early hours of today (Friday, July 31) after a short illness.