Place Name
Jan Steen (1626 – February 3, 1679) was a 17thCentury Dutch artist, famous for his witty moralising scenes of domestic life. It is one of the Dutch-themed names of developments on either side of East Dulwich Grove, so named to celebrate the close links between what was then the Metropolitan Borough of Camberwell and the Netherlands. The parish of Camberwell became a metropolitan borough in 1900 but was abolished altogether in 1965 when it became part of the London Borough of Southwark. Five years earlier Camberwell twinned with Deventer, a town of about 100,000 people in Overijssel province, near Arnhem – Southwark continued the relationship when it incorporated the former borough. As well as exchanging library books, the Deventer link included exchanges of young people from 1960 onward, housewives from 1968 on, and artists, choirs, and sports teams. There was even an older people’s exchange programme – Dutch OAPs spent a week or two at Southwark’s welfare home at Bexhill-on-Sea, while their British counterparts stayed in retirement homes or the homes of local families. See also Arnhem Way; Deventer Crescent; Hilversum Crescent; Isel Way; Kempis Way, and Nimegen Way.
