Melton

The history of Melton

The Borough of Melton is a rural area centred around the market town of Melton Mowbray. Melton Mowbray is home to manufacturers, research and educational institutions and has a long established association with foxhunting, pork pies and Stilton cheese. Melton's history is still evident today if one looks above the modern shop frontages and at buildings such as the Anne of Cleves' House, a gift from King Henry VIII to his divorced wife in the mid 16th century. The cathedral-sized St. Mary's Church dates from 1170 and its 100 foot tower dominates the town. Outside the town, the Borough has a rural feel with rolling green hills, valleys, small villages, hamlets, gated roads and old village churches, often constructed in local ironstone.

The Historic Melton site offers information on food, hunting, the aristocracy and the press in Melton. Up to date information about the Borough is available on the Melton Borough Council website while Melton On-line includes a clickable map with information about all of the villages and towns in Melton. The Melton Mowbray Town Estate is hundreds of years old and runs several facilities and projects in Melton. Family historians should make sure that they are in contact with the Melton Group of the Leicestershire and Rutland Family History Society. Foxhunting in the area is covered by the Foxhunting Voices project at Melton Carnegie Museum. Photos of a few churches in the Melton area can be found at this EMOHA site.

Melton has a historic attachment to flying and boasts a number of airfields which have been the focus of oral history projects. The Buckminster Gliding Club at Saltby airfield have started an oral history project chronicling the history of the area around Saltby, while Vince Holyoaks' On the Wings of the Morning about Bottesford aerodrome also used oral history interviews. There are also a number of interviews in the East Midlands Oral History Archive about the manufacture of Stilton in the area.

• Bottesford Living History
• Redmile Archive