and Kirk at Kirknewton The earliest signs of settlement in the area are the remains of
Iron Age forts on Kaimes Hill and
Dalmahoy Hill, craggy summits about a mile east of Kirknewton. In slightly more recent times,
Kirknewton House, which lies just to the south of the village, had its origins (as Meadowbank House) in the 17th century. The current house is a reworking of the original by the architect
William Playfair for
Alexander Maconochie, Lord Meadowbank in 1835. Kirknewton House is screened by trees from nearby roads and from the village itself. The most obvious evidence of its existence is the entrance lodge beside the start of the drive to the house at the south end of the village. Ormiston House is a Scottish baronial mansion south of Kirknewton. It was built in 1851 for Archibald Wilkie, to a design by
David Bryce. Kirknewton stood at the south eastern corner of the large area of
West Lothian which was transformed from the 1860s by the
oil shale industry, with the nearest shale mine lying just to the north west of the village, between it and
East Calder. Shale from here was taken to the huge oil shale works at
Pumpherston for processing. During
World War II, the
Royal Air Force built a military airfield at Whitemoss, a mile south east of Kirknewton.
RAF Kirknewton, as it was known, was home to a variety of units during the war and, like many other military airfields, fell quiet afterwards. In 1952 it became home to a number of small
United States Air Force units tasked with providing mobile radio facilities to the USAF in Britain. The USAF left in 1966, and today Kirknewton airfield is home to a
RAF(V) Gliding Unit, 661 (RAF Kirknewton) VGS. ==Education==