Hunmanby

History

The village's name of Hunmanby originated with the Danes, appearing in the Domesday Book as 'Hundemanbi' meaning 'farmstead of the hounds men', relating to the hunting down of wolves on the Yorkshire Wolds.

Evidence exists showing that Hunmanby was occupied by much earlier people than the Danes. A landslip occurred in 1907 revealing a British chariot burial site from the 1st or 2nd century BC, in which a chariot was buried horse and all. A tumulus on a local farm was opened up to reveal an ancient burial site containing 15 skeletons. Roman pottery and flint axe and arrowheads are frequently found in and around Hunmanby.

Given by William the Conqueror to Gilbert De Gant, De Gant lived in a house "without the town" named Le Burlyn (Old French for wool house), regarded to be built on the site where now stands Low Hall, the manor of Hunmanby became one of the most powerful in the North of England. His son William founded Burlington Bridlington Priory. Changing hands through the centuries many times the manor maintained its importance until the end of the 19th century, when the hereditary Lords of the Manor sold the estate piece by piece. The manor belonged from the 1620s to the 1830s to the Osbaldestons, a branch of a prominent Lancashire family; the most notable member of the family was Richard Osbaldeston, Bishop of London 1762–64. The manor passed by inheritance to the Mitford family, of whom the most notable was the novelist Bertram Mitford.

It was the main market town for the East Riding of Yorkshire and is said to be the last place in England where King Stephen kept his wolfhounds. It has a number of important buildings including Low Hall. The original hall, which dates from the 11th century, and Hunmanby Hall, a Queen Anne era building erected to replace the original hall on a more elevated site. The Hall was built from stones taken from Filey Brigg.

After the death of Lord Nunburnholme in the early part of the 19th century, the Hall was bought by the Methodist Education Committee and re-opened in April 1928 as a boarding school for girls. The school closed in 1992 and could take up to 300 girls.

Today

Hunmanby has a number of businesses located within the village, despite its small size. These include Deep Sea Electronics Plc, Cirrus Research Plc, Humprenco, Peninsula Group, Barcodereaders.com, the Apollo Group and the Beck Engineering Group. The dinosaurs for Blackgang Chine on the Isle of Wight were manufactured in Hunmanby by Beck Engineering and featured on the TV series Blue Peter. Historically it was the home of the Solar Dome greenhouse company, who made an unusual geodetic dome-shaped greenhouse and also had one of only two car manufacturers in Yorkshire in 1911.

Hunmanby is also the location of a television transmitter which acts as a local relay filler for Filey, Bridlington and the surrounding villages which are unable to receive transmissions from Oliver's Mount and Belmont. It also is a terminal for the VSNL Northern Europe submarine telecommunications cable connecting with De Marne in the Netherlands.

In 2010, Hunmanby won a Silver-gilt at the Britain in Bloom awards, this was the first time the village had entered the competition.

There is also an Autograss track just outside the village.