Leitch St in Somerfield – Probably named after Daniel Leitch. Leitch was living at nearby 49 Wordsworth Street in 1904. First mentioned in The Press in 1880. In the Star in 1900 it is described as a “continuation of Smollett Street”. First appears in street directories in 1909.

A small amount of information from the library website and if it was named after a person there is usually an s on the end of the street name. Wordsworth St isn’t exactly nearby either but I couldn’t find any information about the street name. It was only one ad in 1900 that claimed Leitch St to be a continuation of Smollett St plus someone in 1919 argued that the name of the street should be changed to Smollett St because it was a continuation of that street. Papers Past mostly had birth and death notices but 1953 there was a brief mention of a resident on this street being a survivor of the Tangiwai train disaster. In 1880 there were several ads for the sale of 70 sections with frontages to Leitch St and Dunn St and that these streets would thus connect Colombo St South via Smollett St to Selwyn St. The difference in how long it would now take to travel to the Selwyn St area was mentioned as it would reduce the travelling time. More sections were available in 1900 and 1923. I couldn’t find out the name of the original landowner who was selling the sections in 1880. The shop on the corner of Strickland St and Leitch St was damaged by a suspicious fire in 1986. There is still a business here and it is now a hairdresser.

Over a quarter of the houses on this street were built between 1900 and 1920 and the one from 1900 is built from brick which is unusual so I suspect that it has been recladded but I could be wrong. These older houses are disappearing fast and being demolished by developers who are putting up ugly modern houses which are totally out of keeping with the lovely older houses on this street. There are also a lot of houses built in the 1980s and many of these are on back sections. There was one house that was a mess and it is rather obvious that a hoarder lives here.

Edited to say that I have solved the mystery of Daniel Leitch as his name was Daniel Leach and he lived on Lower Windmill Rd aka Antigua St but then moved to 49 Wordsworth St. The ancestry website have a few entries with the Leitch spelling but most entries including UK records have the Leach spelling.

Ignore my previous edit as the street is more likely to have been named after Charles Leitch who lived on South Christchurch Rd AKA Old Christchurch Rd which eventually because Strickland St. Charles Leitch had a connection with Robert Dunn who Dunn St is named after. There doesn’t seem to be a connection between Charles Leitch and Daniel Leitch AKA Daniel Leach but information on the Ancestry website is a bit sketchy.

Penrith Ave in Somerfield – formerly Penrith Street. Penrith Street was named in 1937. Penrith Avenue first appears in street directories in 1940.

A tiny amount of information from the library website. Going by brief article in 1937 about naming of the new street it was called Penrith Street but it seems to have been known under both names of Penrith St and Penrith Ave from the beginning. Penrith is a town in Cumbia so it is easy to think that the street is named after this town. My personal feeling is that whoever came up with the name for the street made a mistake. I feel that the street should have been named Penwith after an area in Cornwall.

On Papers Past there were lots of death notices plus best street and garden competition entries. One real estate ad in 1979 caught my eye as it described the house being sold as an Historic Homestead. Most of the houses on this street were built in the 1930s and 1940s with about a dozen built more recently including a couple of ugly ones built in 2023. I ended up looking at old maps and a map of Spreydon dated 1912 helped plus ancestry website. I had another look at Papers Past but not looking for Penrith Ave or Penrith Street.

There are two older houses on Penrith Ave dating from 1915 and 1920. The map showed just two properties where the street now is sited. There is a slight kink in the street and that will be because of the boundaries of the two properties. The house from 1920 doesn’t stand out from it’s 1930s neighbours and I haven’t found out who originally owned it. The house on the corner of Strickland St and Penrith Ave is a different story. I thought that this house was on Strickland St and mentioned it when I walked Strickland St in January 2019. I wasn’t doing quite so much research into the history of the streets when I first started my street project. The house on the corner of Strickland St and Penrith Ave is gorgeous. The original owner of this house John Martin Mitchell died in 1929 in London aged 54. Edited to say that the obituary got his age wrong and he was 64 or 65 when he died and he is buried at St Agnes in Cornwall. His wife died a few months later aged 65. The address of the house those days was 71 Strickland St so I was partly right. It looks like after street was formed that the address became 49 Penrith Ave. John Martin Mitchell started the firm J M Mitchell and he sold furniture from his shop in Colombo St. Lots of photos and information on Papers Past when the shop was destroyed by fire in 1977. Also at 71 Strickland Street Mrs H S Mitchell ran Spreydon Rabbitry but she decided to give up rabbit farming in 1934. It was mostly Angora rabbits that she was breeding and they were bred for their wool. Note I haven’t worked out exactly where Mrs H S Mitchell fits into the family. John Martin Mitchell was from the Penwith area of Cornwall which is why I think that they got the street name wrong.

If they ever decide to open this house to the public during Heritage Festival I will be first in the queue. Looking at my photos I realise that there is an Art Deco house on this street but forgot about it as I got seriously sidetracked by the older house.

McCombs St in Somerfield – Named after Elizabeth Reid McCombs (1873- 1935). Elizabeth McCombs was a socialist, social worker and politician. She was a member of the Christchurch City Council from 1921. Developed in a state housing area in what was Spreydon in 1937. Named in 1937. First appears in street directories in 1940.

A small amount of information from the library website. The library have neglected to mention that she was the first woman MP in New Zealand. McCombs St and the neighbouring Cooke St were developed as State Housing streets at the same time.

Papers Past had lots of death notices and a few birth notices. Several mentions of best street and best garden competitions. In 1951 the tenants in the State Houses were offered the opportunity to buy their houses. The Christchurch City Council opposed this offer claiming that it was against their bylaws. The government overruled the council in this matter and the tenants were able to buy their houses.

All bar two houses on this street were built in the 1930s and there were at least three Art Deco houses. A few show their State House beginnings but many have been modified.

Cooke St in Somerfield – Named after Frederick Riley Cooke (1867- 1930). Cooke was a tailor, socialist, trade unionist and Christchurch City councillor 1920-1930. Developed in a state housing area in what was Spreydon in 1937. Named in 1937. First appears in street directories in 1940.

A small amount of information from the library website and I found the same article the library website mentioned. Papers Past had an ad in 1938 about the State Houses being available for rent. Lots of death notices on Papers Past and a couple of birth notices. The best street competition had a few mentions.

Most houses on this street were built in the 1930s and they do have an obvious 1930s State House look about them. There is also a block of houses built between 2020 and 2023 and looking at street view the houses that were demolished to make way for these developments also looked like they were 1930s State Houses. Most of the houses on this street are now privately owned but none of the houses from the 1930s stood out for me. The one that did stand out was built in 2023 and I don’t usually like modern houses but this one was built by the developers whose style I quite like.

Carey St in Somerfield – Named in 1941, when the tender of Mr J. L. Gant for the building of eight blocks of cottage homes for aged persons, comprising 32 units, was accepted by the Christchurch City Council. The cottages were to be on property in Dunn Street where a new street was to be constructed named Carey Street. First appears in street directories in 1943. No residents are listed.

A reasonable amount of information from the library website. The street was probably named after a government official but I couldn’t find out who it was named after.

Papers Past had a large number of death notices for this street but considering it was for pensioners this isn’t surprising. There was a brief article about an elderly woman who was found dead in one of the units. In 1984 there was several articles about the units being revamped. Then in 1985 the articles were about them no longer getting revamped because of Government funding being cut. More recent articles were about the units being uneconomic to repair and that the Carey St Social Housing was closed. As late as 2023 there was talk about affordable housing being built on the street but no one seemed to be able to work out the best way of doing this.

When I walked this street today the old units have obviously been demolished and there are new units being built. When I looked at street view the old units were on big sections. There were originally 32 units on this land and I imagine that they will probably build double that number.

When looking at Papers Past I kept finding articles about a horse called Carey Street. I also found out that in the UK / England the term on Carey Street was frequently used for someone who was bankrupt. This was because the bankruptcy court was on Carey Street in London.

Selsey Lane in Somerfield – Probably named after Selsey, a town and civil parish in the Chichester district of West Sussex. First appears in street directories in 1976. A tiny amount of information on the library website and I couldn’t find any information on the naming of the street. The street is where 130 and 132 Studholme St used to be but I couldn’t find any information for those addresses. Not much information on Papers Past. Several ads for houses especially in the late 1970s and early 1980s. A few death notices. Most houses here were built in the 1970s and made from summerhill stone. There were a few houses from 2016 as well. I only walked a small part of the street as the footpath only goes part of the way along the street.

Saskia Lane in Somerfield and nothing on library website. The street runs off Selwyn where 101 and 103 Selwyn St used to be and all the houses were built in the 1990s. I suspect that the street is named after a person but without a surname it is harder to find. In the 1920s the property at one of those addresses was a poultry farm but from 1940s onwards it seemed to have been a market garden. In 1984 there was a big garage sale of household items at one of the addresses.

I only walked part of the street as the footpath only goes part way along the street. The houses are mostly made from brick which was a common building material for the 1990s. It looked like it would be a pleasant street to live on.

Kantara Lane in Somerfield and nothing on library website. This tiny private lane runs off Somerfield St and it doesn’t have a footpath. All the houses were built in the 1980s and all but two of the entries on Papers Past were real estate ads. There was one death notice and the other entry was about someone winning a house on this street. In 1984 a woman from Addington won a townhouse worth $95,000 in a lottery. The lottery was a fundraiser for the Society for Intellectual Handicapped. Just to be confusing Google maps also have this lane running off Ashgrove Tce but that is incorrect as what they have labelled as Kantara Lane is actually the driveway for houses at 297 Ashgrove Tce. My Apple maps have it correct which is amusing after the fun we had with Apple maps a couple of years ago.

Moana St in Somerfield – formerly part of Tainui Street. First mentioned in The Press in 1936. First appears in street directories in 1938.

A tiny amount of information from the library website. Not much information on Papers Past and I only looked at Moana St and not from when it was Tainui St. It was too confusing to try and separate what entries related to this street and what entries related to the part of the street that kept the Tainui St name. The street became Moana St in the 1930s. There was mostly ads on Papers Past with a few death notices. A young girl was attacked and indecently assaulted in 1976 when she was walking home from Girl Guides.

This is a lovely tree lined street and today when I walked it every tree had a big red ribbon around it. It looked lovely. At least five of the houses date from 1910 and they are gorgeous. The rest seem to be 1930s or 1990s.

Darley St in Somerfield – Named in 1931 at the suggestion of the trustees in the estate of J. L. Scott. First appears in street directories in 1936.

A tiny amount of information from the library website. J L Scott was John Lee Scott and he had an iron foundry Scott Bros with his brother George. J L Scott died in 1913 but his widow didn’t die until 1925. It would have been after her death that the road was formed. Darley was a bit confusing at first as the only Darley that I could find was in Yorkshire and J L Scott was from Derbyshire. Darley in Derbyshire is now known as Darley Dale. I only briefly looked at J L Scott as he sounded like a nice respectable man with no scandals in his life which was unusual for many of our early settlers who have streets named after them.

I was geocaching in the area today and this is a pleasant tree lined street with some lovely houses. More than half the houses here date from the 1930s. Papers Past had many entries relating to beautiful street awards. Several death notices. Many of the ads for houses say that the suburb is Lower Cashmere which is fairly common for this area. In 1931 there was an entry to say that the new proposed street between Barrington St and Tainui St to be named Darley St. People obviously got confused as there was an entry in 1936 that mentioned the confusion and that Darley St and Tainui St were not clearly defined. The article stated that Tainui St runs off Somerfield St. Darley St runs off Barrington St to the new portion of Tainui St. The part of Tainui St that used to run off Barrington St to be renamed Moana St. I need to look at old maps just to satisfy my curiosity plus I like old maps. Edited to say that I did look at old maps and one from 1930 had the street as Scott St which would have been very confusing as there was already a Scott St only a few blocks away. That Scott St was named after the J L Scott and his brother.