[6] The first settlers of European extraction in the area were four stockmen, Leander Lemmon, James McHadden, Bill Gentry, and Alfred Starr, who brought their herds to Huntington Creek in 1875.

In the fall of 1877, in response to the same call from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that brought settlers to the other creeks in Castle Valley, a small group from Fairview, Utah, under the leadership of Elias Cox, established a dugout colony on the banks of Huntington Creek and began digging irrigation canals.

A majority of the early settlers came from the Sanpete Valley, which by the late 1870s had outgrown its irrigable land, and many belonged to three or four interrelated kinship groups, making for an abundance of cousins in the community.

The first structure erected on the new townsite was a 40-by-60-foot (12 by 18 m) log meetinghouse, which was completed in time for an all-night New Year's Eve party on 31 December 1880.

The first homes, some of which were still occupied until recent years, were typically of sawed log or plank construction or of adobe sheathed with lumber.

Alfalfa seed was an important cash crop around the start of the 20th century, and honey produced by local apiarist Christian Ottesen won first prize at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1903.

The coal camp of Mohrland, 8 miles (13 km) to the north, active from about 1909 to 1938, was virtually an extension of Huntington, with many residents dividing the year between the mine and the farm.

Its proximity to the regional commercial center of Price, and distance from a major highway, 20 miles (32 km) to the north, has prevented Huntington from developing extensive retail business.

This economic decline was reversed in 1972 when construction began on Utah Power and Light Company's Huntington steam-electric generating plant in the mouth of the canyon.

While the community is still predominantly Mormon, the Mission San Rafael was established in 1977 a few miles south of Huntington to serve Catholic families in western Emery County.

On Monday, August 6, 2007, at 2:48 a.m. (MDT), UtahAmerican Energy's Crandall Canyon Mine, 15 miles (24 km) west northwest of Huntington, collapsed trapping six workers inside.

[12][13][14] On March 22, 2013, one miner died and another was injured after they became trapped in a cave-in at a part of the Castle Valley Mining Complex, about 10 miles (16 km) west of Huntington.

[15] Huntington is located in northwestern Emery County near the mouth of a long canyon that cuts diagonally into the Wasatch Plateau.