Pedaling my bicycle up the long, relentless incline of Vauxhall Street Extension in Waterford, the last hill in a day of hills, my mind wandered, a useful tool when legs painfully beg for mercy.

Perhaps due to reduced oxygen to the brain, I began to contemplate the name Vauxhall. It sounded like a bawdy 1800s dance hall.

My curiosity became a balm for discomfort, the distraction flowing over my brain like endorphins, warm icing on a hot cross bun. As the hill leveled off, I vowed to investigate the name Vauxhall.

Vauxhall Street in New London, and its Siamese twin, Vauxhall Street Extension in Waterford, is a 5.5 mile ribbon of historic asphalt that has felt the boots of colonial soldiers, horse’s hooves, wagon wheels and now the high tech rubber of modern automobile tires.

It runs from Williams Street, where it borders New London’s Post Hill Historic District, all the way north to the Waterford-Montville line, where it ends at a fork with Turner Road and East Lake Road.

The name Vauxhall derives from a manor owned by British military leader Falkes de Breaute, acquired in 1216 when he married into money and land that is today’s Vauxhall suburb of London.

He renamed his manor house Falkes Hall. As often happens, over time, Falkes Hall evolved into Fox Hall, which eventually became Vauxhall.

After his death, the estate became, some say through devious means, the property of the crown, eventually becoming a suburb of London.

The name Vauxhall is ubiquitous in England. It’s used in the names of businesses, schools, college dormitories, summer camps ‑ you name it.

It appears throughout the transportation system, in Vauxhall Bridge and Vauxhall Bridge Road. Vauxhall Cross is a convergence of streets near a major hub for trains and buses at Vauxhall Station.

There’s a Vauxhall City Farm, Vauxhall Park and the historic Royal Vauxhall Tavern.

Thames connection

These lie in de Breaute’s Vauxhall, a London suburb of commercial and residential properties situated, quite appropriately, on the River Thames.

It is home to Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens, once a leading public venue in the 1700s and now a public park.

Years ago, a “pleasure garden” was a large, public place for entertainment, socialization and refreshment, on acres of trees and shrubs, with attractive walks and open areas and pavilions for performers.

In 1785, the first admission fees helped fund tightrope walkers, hot-air balloon ascents, concerts and fireworks.

Meanwhile, streets in New London had gone unnamed for many years, and the road now called Vauxhall, in use since the beginning of the settlement, had long been casually referred to as the Colchester Road.

In 1781, it felt the boots and heard the shouts of Benedict Arnold and marauding British troops as they burned houses along its path.

According to Frances Manwaring Caulkins’s “History of New London,” New London conducted a survey to organize its streets in 1807, and “all those that were without names in common use, had names affixed to them by the city authorities.”

Vauxhall Street was so named by the city because a popular house on the road, owned by Thaddeus Brooks, a 16-year member of New London’s “common council,” was well known and “used as a place of resort for refreshments, suppers, clubs and other parties.”

You know, like the famous Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens across the Atlantic in the Vauxhall section of London.

Climbing Vauxhall’s hill was no pleasure garden, but offered reward. Curious minds can lead us down the most interesting roads.

John Steward lives in Waterford. He can be reached at tossinglines.com.