Oxford Street and Cambridge Streets were named after the universities of Oxford and Cambridge in England. They were amongst the first streets in Panmure to be given titles but it had to wait until 1877 for this to be done, a good 20 years after the creation of Panmure. The reason for the delay was that the townspeople of East London were desperately tardy in taking municipal authority into their own hands, and the Resident Magistrate had far too much other work to do and had no time to think about issuing names for the town's streets.

See also: Panmure East London street names

Even after a municipality was formed in 1873, however, the councillors were hesitant to get essential services organised. It was therefore left to the second Triennial Council (1877-1880) to start giving titles to the streets.

Dr Keith Tankard