Kirkwood Avenue in the suburb of Upper Riccarton, Christchurch

Kirkwood Avenue – Formerly Carleton’s Road and Carleton Road. Named after John Carleton (1840- 1894), and his wife, Ann, of Ilam Farm. Re-named Kirkwood Avenue. Named after Archibald McKirdy Kirkwood (1863?-1935). Carleton’s Road is shown on an 1864 map. The Carletons lived in a two-storey cob cottage and Carleton Road was originally the road into their property off Clyde Road. It was later connected through to Ilam Road and re-named Kirkwood Avenue by the Waimairi County Council on 8 February 1933. Kirkwood is a resident. Hannah Carleton (1878?-1969) married Archibald Kirkwood in 1908.

A reasonable amount of information from the library website.I didn’t check Ancestry website but Papers Past gave me a lot of information.
The council held a special meeting in 1932 to discuss duplication of street names that were a source of annoyance to Post Authority and the Fire Brigade. Also doctors were going to wrong addresses when called out on urgent calls, Carleton Ave was changed to Kirkwood Ave. Kirkwood family lived at Ilam Farm that was on Carleton Ave.
There was a Bullivant family who lived in Carleton House on Kirkwood Ave. In 1945 there were articles about the building of a school. Several sections were for sale in 1936 to 1938.
There was an article in 1945 about a body being found in a house on Kirkwood Ave and I shouldn’t be amused but the person’s name was Nora Body.

This street had a few houses but the Kirkwood School took up much of one side of the street and a few University buildings on the other side. One house near the Clyde Road end looked old and a pity it was a bit rundown as it would have been a lovely house if looked after. Near the Ilam Road end there was an Art Deco looking house.. Most of the houses were at the Ilam Road end. Looked like a nice street but all those school children would put me off plus the parking issues. No I don’t particularly like children especially en masse.