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Then family name "Hubbard" has an old English origin that may date back 1,000 years. The definitive text on the origins of this name is Edward Warrin Day's "One Thousand Years of Hubbard History" published in 1895. The name is sometimes said to be derivative of "Hubert" but, in fact, there seems to be no genealogical basis for this claim. It is also sometimes claimed to mean "one of high intellect" but this also contradicts the detailed history provided by Day's book.

According to Day, the name Hubbard derives from King Hubba, a Danish conqueror who raided East Anglia in the 9th century AD. However, it is not necessarily the case that modern day Hubbards are descendents of King Hubba. It may merely mean that they are descendents of the inhabitants of one of the towns named "Hubbard" long after the time of King Hubba. Contrary to the title of the book, the actual name of Hubbard cannot be dated to the first millennium.

The earliest person named Hubbard mentioned in Day's book is John Hubbard of Monks Eleigh, Suffolk, born in 1230 AD. A survey of genealogies on www.ancestry.com shows that any Hubbard who traces their history back this far invariably traces it to this John Hubbard (this may or may not, in fact, be the case, but clearly most Hubbard family histories have been informed partly by Day’s book).

The book explains that Hubbard had other spellings and it was not uncommon for the same individual to spell their own names in more than one way. A common concurrent spelling is “Hobart” which may have been considered an “upper class” spelling compared to the more humble “Hubbard”.

Early prominent Hubbard’s include Sir James Hubbard (also spelled “Hobart”), the Attorney General of England from 1486 to 1507, appointed by King Henry VII and knighted by the same (d. 1517). Hobart seems to be the more common spelling in genealogies but some legal documents show his name also spelled James Hubbard. Almost all Hubbards alive today seem to trace their lineage to Sir James. He personally funded the building of a church in Loddon, Norfolk and is buried today in the cathedral in Norwich. Sir Henry Hobart (d. 1698), another prominent English barrister and politician, was his great grandson.

By the mid to late 1500’s, many Hubbard’s had become protestants and were persecuted under Queen Mary I of England. Although Queen Elizabeth I ended this persecution, subsequent reforms in the Church of England displeased many Protestants. Hubbard’s were among the earliest English settlers of New England, coming to America as part of the protestant migration from England in the early 1600’s.

Prominent Hubbard’s today include: Al Hubbard (1915–1984), Disney comics artist

Cal Hubbard (1900–1977), American professional football player and Major League Baseball umpire

Dominic Hubbard, 6th Baron Addington (born 1963), British politician

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915), American philosopher and writer

Freddie Hubbard (born 1938), American jazz trumpeter

Gardiner Greene Hubbard (1822–1897), the founder and first president of the National Geographic Society

Harlan Hubbard(1900-1988) Kentucky writer and artist

John Hubbard (1794–1838), American physician and politician

Jordan Hubbard (born 1963), co-founder of the FreeBSD operating system project

Kin Hubbard (1868–1930), American cartoonist, humorist, and journalist

L. Ron Hubbard (1911–1986), American science fiction writer and creator of Scientology

Lucius Frederick Hubbard (1836–1913), American politician

Richard B. Hubbard, American politician

Rob Hubbard (born c.1956), composer

Samuel Dickinson Hubbard (1799–1855), United States Postmaster General

Thomas Hubbard (1898-1961), British Member of Parliament for Kirkcaldy 1944-1959

William Hubbard (1621-1704), American Colonial-era clergyman and historical writer

Douglas Wayne Hubbard (1962-), inventor of Applied Information Economics and president of Hubbard Decision Research.

Edward Day’s book online: http://www.geocities.com/edmund_hobart/