Kenilworth Road is somewhere I, and thousands of others, have spent many happy Saturday afternoons and Tuesday evenings, and just as many unhappy ones. Not actually in the street, but at the theatre of dreams that was opened in 1905 and still houses Luton Town Football Club. Even during the dullest match it did not cross my mind to question why it was called Kenilworth Road. Now that I have looked into this question what answer can I find? Obviously the ground takes its name from the street but whether this applied from the earliest days I am not sure. The earliest reference I have found to the street name is in a 1909 directory. At least three possibilities can be examined for the street name – person, building, or place. The only person I can find as a candidate is Lord Kenilworth but he has to be ruled out on chronological grounds. The first Lord Kenilworth was John Davenport Siddeley (1866-1953) famous for the Armstrong –Siddeley company, manufacturer of cars and aircraft, but he was only created Lord Kenilworth in 1937. The second option is that it was named after a building, namely Kenilworth Castle in Warwickshire. The nearby Warwick Road could support this theory as Warwick, also in Warwickshire, has a castle. Avondale Road leading into Kenilworth Road is also linked with a castle, Avondale Castle being an alternative name for Strathaven Castle in Scotland. Did someone responsible for naming these streets have an interest in castles? It becomes more intriguing when the names of Union-Castle liners are taken into account. S.S. Avondale Castle was built for the Castle Line in 1897 with Royal Mail Steamer (RMS) Kenilworth Castle launched in 1904. They were sailing at the right time for someone with a maritime interest to use them in Luton street names. There was also a Warwick Castle in the fleet, but this was not launched until 1930, which is too late to influence these street names.
If Kenilworth Road was not named after a person, castle or ship was it simply named after the village of Kenilworth? Many streets in Luton are named after towns and villages but these are not usually random. Often they reflect the origin of the developers and are more common from the 1930s onwards. Examples are the Leicester Road area, built by a Midlands-based company and the roads around Somerset Avenue built by a company based in Bath. The streets around Kenilworth Road have names based on trees, including Ash, Oak, Beech and Maple. Hazelbury Crescent also seems to refer to a tree. Warwick Road is the other place name but no evidence has been found to show that anybody concerned with this development had connections with Kenilworth and Warwick in England.
What about Kenilworth in another country? Reading the story of the Wernher family (Grand Dukes and Diamonds – The Wernhers of Luton Hoo, by Raleigh Trevelyan) two place names caught my eye. One was Kenilworth described as a model village, built in the late 1880s by the De Beers Company, for white employees working at the Kimberley diamond mine in South Africa. The other name was Waldeck’s Plant where a very large diamond was found by Julius Wernher in the 1870s. Waldeck Road, opposite Kenilworth Road, was named in the 1880s so the question arises is there an African theme. This seems more likely when it is known that Warwick and Avondale are also place names in what is now South Africa. Were these place names in use in Africa before the roads were named in Luton? The Warwick wine estate was named in 1902 by a man who had been a Colonel in the Warwickshire Regiment in the Boer War.
Waldeck is also a place in what is now Germany. I believe that the likeliest reason for Waldeck Road being named is to honour Princess Helena of Waldeck and Pyrmont (1861 – 1922). In 1882 she married Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, youngest son of Queen Victoria. He died from a fall in France in March 1884. Waldeck Road does not appear on the 1881 census but I have seen it on sale particulars dated 1887 so perhaps this street belongs in the category of ‘Royal Streets’, either named shortly after the wedding or on the death of the husband.
After looking at the options for Kenilworth Road what conclusions can be drawn? Links with both South Africa and castles seem possible, or even a nautical angle, but nothing definite can be stated. Perhaps further perusal of the Luton News of the early 20th century and other sources will provide the answer.