The name Lassodie was a collective for three settlements, named Old Rows, New Rows (or Parley), and Fairfield, all lying on a road from
Kingseat to a series of mines. The name derives from the
Scots Gaelic lios aodann, meaning "garden on the brow of a hill". The earliest known record of the name is as "Lassody", describing a tower in the
Blaeu Atlas of Scotland of 1654. The first known use of the area was as the site of a mill in the 18th century, and then as a farm, known as Braehead, belonging to the Dewar family, who held the Lairdship of Lassodie. The right to collect coal was leased from 1825 at the latest, and pit mining is known to have taken place in the area from 1856. In 1860, Messrs. Thomas Spowart & Company, Ltd. took a lease over the minerals of the estate. Several hundred men were employed and the village (with a school) erected in short order. The village was difficult to find, being 6 miles from the nearest railway station, and offering an appearance of "a row or two and a farm house" (Lassodie House, the home of the laird) from a distance. However, in May 1931, the company closed the mines, and ordered the miners - whose conditions of employment contained a requirement to live in the village houses - to leave within 14 days. A handful of people stayed behind, living without street lighting or sanitary facilities, until on 15 October 1944 the remaining villagers agreed to leave for
Weir houses in Kelty and
Halbeath. The remains of the village were almost completely destroyed in the 1960s for the creation of the St Ninians Colliery
open cast mine. == Demography ==