The church dedicated to St Mary Magdalene at East Moors is a Grade II* listed building situated behind the trees by the red phone box, and accessed along a grassy moorland track popular with ramblers.

This charming little church was built in 1882 as part of the indomitable Vicar Gray’s campaign to serve this area of his parish at a time when some 200 people lived in this remote part of the moors. The church was reputedly one of the last buildings designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott Jnr, though the construction was supervised by Temple Moore, this being the young architect’s first major project. The painted wagon roof of the nave and chancel, and the stepped bell-tower would become characteristic of his later work; and he also designed the font, reredos and the wooden partitioning to the south aisle. (See the information on St Chad, Sproxton for more about Temple Moore.)

It is said that, before the age of the motorcar, clergy would ride out to East Moors on a Saturday evening and sleep in a hammock in the south aisle to be on time for the Sunday service. The aisle would then accommodate the Sunday school, for whom a 'squint' opening enabled them to see what was happening at the altar …… or was the ‘squint’ perchance to allow people in the chancel to keep an eye on those in the south aisle? Whichever the case, it is certainly an unusual feature.

The only stained glass in the church is the East window above the altar. This is reputedly by Burlison & Grylls, London-based stained-glass glaziers (founded in 1868) whose premises and records were bombed and destroyed in 1945. Other windows by them are to be found in All Saints’ church, Helmsley.

John Betjeman, a passionate advocate for Victorian architecture, devoted a poem to the church at East Moors:
... a stane kirk wi' a wee spire
And a verra wee south aisle
The rhododendrons bloom wi'oot
On ilka Simmer's day
And it's there the Airl o' Feversham
Wad hae his tenants pray
For there's something in the painted roof
And the mouldings round the door,
The braw bench and the plain font
That tells o' Temple Moore.

from “Perp. Revival i' the North” in Collected Poems (London, 1976)

The above information is taken from the following sources: http://www.templemooretrail.co.uk/temple-moore-buildings-in-2/east-moors-st-mary-magdalen.html
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1149272