Facts about Dinnington
General Info
Dinnington is a town and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham in South Yorkshire, England. It is near to the towns of Worksop and Rotherham and cities of Sheffield and Doncaster.
Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Dinnington is the principal settlement in the civil parish of Dinnington St John’s, which also includes the small satellite hamlets of Throapham and St John’s. The Dinnington St John’s parish is the most populous constituent of the St John’s ward, which also includes the parishes of Laughton-en-le-Morthen, Firbeck, Letwell and Gildingwells. In 2001 this ward had a population of 11,476, with Dinnington St John’s itself making up 9,161 of that figure. The population of the ward at the 2011 Census had increased to 12,517. Dinnington is about 330 feet (101 m) above sea level.
History
Excavations show Dinnington to have been inhabited since at least Neolithic times, and it has been suggested that the settlement takes its name from a local barrow, though a more traditional interpretation of “Dinnington” would be “Dunn’s Farmstead”, or “Town of Dunn’s People”.
Dinnington was originally a small, isolated farming community, based around the New Road area of the town. Quarrying in the area helped expand the population, but it was the sinking of the Dinnington Main Colliery in 1905 that led to the real growth of the settlement. The census of 1911 shows a twenty-fold increase in population since 1901, from 250 to 5,000.
