Nairn Street – formerly Edenbridge Street. Named after David Nairn (1833-1916). Edenbridge Street is first mentioned in The Press in 1880 when a property for sale there is advertised. First appears in street directories in 1902. Re-named Nairn Street on 1 September 1948 when 120 streets were re-named. Nairn was a nurseryman who established businesses at Burke Street, Barrington Street and, later, 166 Lincoln Road. His last nursery was in Edenbridge Street. The business closed in the 1960s when its land was bought by the Ministry of Works for motorway development.
A reasonable amount of information from the library website and I wasn’t expecting the street to have been named after a person. Papers Past had several ads for sale of sections in 1880 and 1885. In 1881 there was a section for sale that was described as being next to Mr Nairn’s gardens. In 1891 there were ads for houses and described as being near the new showgrounds. Note David Nairn was involved in the A and P Society for 47 years by the time he died in 1916. In 1930s there were sections for sale by Nairn and sons and there are many houses on this street built in the 1930s. A few houses from 1905 and 1910 and a couple from 200 and 2013.
Couldn’t find anything about the name change and Edenbridge is a place in Kent.
Will have to see if I can find David Nairn’s grave in the Addington cemetery.
Some lovely old wooden villas on this street and I would loved to have got more photos. I took a photo of a particularly lovely house but the photo was blurry. One newer looking house had so much junk in the front yard you couldn’t actually see the house. I ended up talking to a local who said it is a lovely street to live on. He knew that there had been a gardener nearby but didn’t that the street was named after him and told me that the street was named after a place in Scotland.
Lytteltonwitch's Walking the streets of Christchurch Project 