Like the Yorkshire Village of the Year judges, CHRIS TITLEY is won over by Sheriff Hutton

WANT to know why Sheriff Hutton was named the Yorkshire Village of the Year? Intrigued as to why it saw off competition from dozens of pretty, friendly places competing for the title? Just ask Dennis and Vera Donaldson. They celebrate their first anniversary as Sheriff Hutton residents next month, yet they feel as though they have lived here all their lives.

Or turn to Alan Farnaby and Eric Hayhurst, editors of the Sheriff Hutton Village News, published every month for nigh on 31 years and always boasting a packed diary of events.

Or pop in to the Post Office and Village Store, run by David and Margaret Shaw - as much a meeting place as a business.

Or catch up with the clergy at the welcoming Anglican and Methodist churches; the licensees of the two charity-minded pubs; or any of the countless volunteers who devote hours to organising everything from sponsored toddles to the annual village art exhibition.

If you spend much time in Sheriff Hutton you'll soon know many of these industrious villagers by name. It's that sort of place. Those still searching for the English identity in the wake of Scottish and Welsh devolution might find their answer in this ancient Yorkshire parish.

Before Dennis and Vera Donaldson moved to the village from Pinner, near Harrow, they had visited many times. Their daughter Jill lives here with her husband Neil and was always raving about the place.

Vera soon discovered the reason for her enthusiasm. "Each time we visited we walked around the village and every single person stopped," she said. "They didn't just say hello, they stopped and would stay and talk for about three quarters of an hour. Everyone was so friendly. We felt at home here before we moved in."

Dennis and Vera moved to Sheriff Hutton last August and found they had only one problem: which activities to opt out of. "There's so much going on that we would like to join. We have joined two or three things."

Dennis addressed the Village of the Year judges on their happy experience as newcomers. This helped to clinch the Yorkshire (North-East) title for Sheriff Hutton. The good news broke yesterday, just another busy day for Dennis who was showing visitors around the exhibition to mark the 900th anniversary of St Helen's parish church, and then playing a game of bowls on the village's incomparable bowling green.

Parish councillor Brian Parkinson helped organise Sheriff Hutton's Village of the Year bid. The competition replaced the 40-year-old Best Kept Village competition, and he said it puts greater emphasis on community life and less on the 'picture postcard' appearance of entrants.

Few villages could rival the community life of Sheriff Hutton. Mr Parkinson reeled off an exhausting, but not exhaustive, list of activities. Children are particularly well catered for: junior cricket, badminton, tennis and football teams are affiliated to the senior clubs. Flourishing youth drama groups have inspired at least two young villagers to go on to study for a career in the performing arts.

Groups for pre-school children are now held four days a week in the village hall. The Church Music Club has a children's choir, and the church also runs a youth outreach group.

Those residents over 60 can join the Luncheon Club. The two pubs, The Highwayman and The Castle Inn, take turns in providing the meals every Tuesday in the autumn and winter. A village auction, where everything from furniture to bicycles were sold, raised £2,000 which will fund the club for the next three years.

It soon becomes clear that Sheriff Hutton is a charitable place. Yesterday morning at 7.30am a breakfast was being held at the old schoolhouse to raise funds for a good cause. Meanwhile, volunteers administer a fund that provides help to any villager that needs it, and pays for community projects.

Private parties are shown around the historic ruined castle for a fee donated to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. Legendary fundraising group The Jumblies has raised £6,000 for various charities through its jumble sales.

And we haven't yet mentioned the art group, the naturalist group, those drawing up the 14ft by 8ft Millennium map, or the active parish council."Most people are in two or three village organisations," Mr Parkinson said. No wonder "everybody knows virtually everybody else". He believes that part of the reason for its community spirit is its size; the population, at around 1,000, has stayed constant for 170 years, although there has been substantial housing development. That leaves the village not too big to be impersonal and not too small to be deadly quiet.

For three decades the Village News has chronicled Sheriff Hutton's many events. Next month's edition, the 370th, will carry a front page report of the Yorkshire Village of the Year victory.

"It's quite a job sometimes getting it all in," says co-founder and co-editor Alan Farnaby, born and bred in Sheriff Hutton.

The parish paper is a typical community affair, put together by six typists, delivered by 15 distributors and supported by local advertisers. As Mr Farnaby says Sheriff Hutton is "not a few individuals, it's a community".

David Shaw, four years running the post office and store, would agree. The village has lost its other shops and business here "could be better"; but everyone looks out for one another, and pops round to see any older resident who has not been seen out for a day or two.

No wonder people tend to stay put in this village. As Brian Parkinson, 25 years a Sheriff Hutton resident, says: "I live fairly close to the cemetery, and that will be my next move."

PICTURE: Villagers taking part in the Sheriff Hutton Medieval Feast at the weekend.