By Cathy Jones 2025
Churchill Avenue Strathfield is located between The Boulevarde and Homebush Road. Part of this street is located in the Strathfield Town Centre. The construction of Raw Square, in the late 1960s, had the effect of bisecting the residential area of Churchill Avenue from Strathfield CBD.
Churchill Avenue was originally known as ‘The Avenue’. The name was changed due to duplication with a street with the same name in Homebush. The name Churchill was adopted after World War II and named after British Wartime Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.
Churchill Avenue, between Elva Street and Homebush Road contains primarily Federation styled buildings. The relatively late development of this estate occurred, because the much of the land was considered unusable due to the presence of a large watercourse, created by overflow water from Powells Creek (which runs at nearby Elva Street and finishes at Strathfield Square).
Most of the houses in Churchill Avenue were built in the early 1900s. The area between Elva Street and Homebush Road was listed as a heritage conservation area in 1987 in Strathfield Council’s Local Environmental Plan.
82 Churchill Ave Strathfield is located on land originally granted to Thomas Rose. Part of the land was acquired by James Richard Powell, who in 1903 sold nine acres to Robert Joshua King (1934) and Mary Anne Balmain (d1934), the wife of surveyor and Town Clerk of Strathfield Council, John Hope Balmain. King and Balmain subdivided the land into residential lots which was marketed as the ‘Kings Estate’. The Kings Estate created the western end of Churchill Avenue (then called The Avenue), Redmyre Road (part) and Homebush Road (part).
About 1908, Robert Joshua King in c.1908 built a house called ‘Miltonia’. The house was let to tenants including Thomas Seth Madeley (1909-1918), Harold D Hobson who changed the name of the house to ‘Lynwood’ (1920-1921) and H Wynter (1922 to 1923).
In 1935 Robert King transferred the property to Norman Stevens King who had lived in the house since 1924. It remained in King‘s ownership until 1955 when it was sold to Mary Catherine Kelly.
In 1959 it was transferred to the Congressional Union of New South Wales. After the formation of the Uniting Church in Australia, the property was transferred to the new church before being sold in 1980 to a private owner.
References
Strathfield Council Building Registers
Land Title searches, NSW Land and Property Information
Sands Sydney and Suburbs Directory 1881-1933
