The Parish of Jurby

Jurby is one of the smallest of the Island parishes, with its traditional boundaries marked by the Lhen and Killane rivers. Jurby Church, a landmark from land, sea and air, and the RAF Wings and Roundel, on the Jurby Parish Crest, symbolise the history of parish, with the golden background on the crest reflecting the cornfields of the ‘bread basket of the North’.

From the earliest days the fertile land of the northern plain was cultivated, and later by Bronze Age farmers, Celts and Vikings. Jurby has a rich Viking heritage with several pagan burial mounds still extant, one in Jurby churchyard, and with Scandinavian Manx Cross-Slabs in the porch of Jurby Church.

The 19th Century saw a decline in farming and the population of Jurby fell as families moved away to find work. By the 1930s Jurby barely existed as a parish. Then, with the threat of war, the Air Ministry saw the flat and low-lying farmlands of Jurby as an ideal location for an aerodrome and a bombing training station. Over 300 acres of farmland was purchased to build an airfield and aerodrome, and RAF Station Jurby opened in 1939.

The building of the RAF Station brought new life to Jurby and shaped the parish of today. Much of the RAF Station is still in evidence, from the control tower, air raid shelters and pill boxes surrounding the airfield, to the ‘married quarters’ which now provide social housing.

Currently there are plans by Government to regenerate and rebrand the Jurby Industrial Estate, and the Jurby Village Development Initiative makes proposals for the Northern side of the road, including additional housing, new footpaths and landscaping and community facilities.