Origins of Nairobi’s Scottish Doonholm name, pioneer cattle dips and man who built Jogoo Road

The Untold story of the forgotten J.K. Watson and his imprint on Kenya

When Scottish farmer James Kerr Watson arrived in Nairobi in January 1908, he perhaps never knew that his decision to name his farm Doonholm would forever be engraved in the city.

Born in Ayrshire Scotland in 1878 JK, as he was known, was only 29 when he wrote to the Colonial Secretary Lord Elgin about the prospects of settling in then British East Africa. While the request was turned down, he still sailed to Kenya - together with his wife Nell - arriving in Mombasa in January 1908. It was the start of an odyssey. They had a piano, one of the first in Kenya, and owned a pony.

Nairobi was then emerging as small township following the arrival of the railway from  Mombasa. Watson, together with his brother Andrew, decided to scout for land and bought some virgin land on the Athi plains for one rupee an acre.  It was teeming with game, treeless and windy.

He started by planting trees to break the landscape monotony. Then he named the farm Doonholm because it reminded him of “the banks and braes and green holms of River Doon that flows through Aysshire. The Scottish name ‘holm’ means a flat ground near a river.

In Doonholm (today wrongly misspelt Donholm) he built a two storey house for his family – the first to be built Nairobi using local labour. He had a quarry on this farm whose stones were used in Nairobi.

Watson’s experiment with dairy cows is sometimes underrated. By 1910, he had 600 crossbread of Ayshire, from his home town, and native stock and was the main supply of milk to the emerging city. During the rainy season, the black cotton soil delayed supplies and he was given permission to construct a murram road towards the town for his use. He named it Doonholm Road and it is now known as Jogoo Road.

In Nairobi town, Watson  had settled as a contractor too, thanks to his Doonholm quarry,  and some of the projects that he undertook included the building of Theatre Royal (Cameo Cinema), modern-day Kenya National Archives building. Perhaps long forgotten is that this was the man who dug up the cotton soil at Nairobi’s Kenyatta Avenue and laid its foundation.  Thus in terms of drainage, and design Watson gets most of the credit for laying the Avenue, then Sixth Avenue, which is the widest of all in the city.

Doonholm produced an average of 200 gallons of milk daily which was supplied to about 250 customers, including Government House (now State House) and local hospitals.

Besides the superb architecture that he gave the town of Nairobi, his contribution to farming was remarkable although it is the designing of cattle dips in Kenya that went to annals of history for a man who had been bluntly told in 1903 that there was no land for farming in Kenya.

Initially, his stock had started to die of east coast fever and Watson was told there was no cure and that if he had to control the ticks, picked from the Athi plains, he had to build dipping tanks.

Records show that he ordered the first drums of chemicals from Coopers and were delivered by Messrs Newlands and Tarlton.

From then on, Doonholm became an experimental farm and one of the memorable notes written to the Agricultural Society of Kenya, of which he was a pioneer acknowledged the role of Watson in East Africa.

One letter dated August 4, 1913 and from Colonel Stordy, the Chief Veterinary Officer noted Watson’s place in history. “In time to come when the history of the stock industry in British East Africa comes to be written, as assuredly it will, it will always be remembered that J.K.Watson (of Doonholm Estate) was the pioneer of stock dipping in the protectorate,” he said.

This cattle dip experiment was prompted by death of his high grade calves due to tick-borne diseases. By then there was no known treatment but he was told that only regular dipping could help him. He decided to build the first cattle dip in Kenya and purchased some dipping chemicals from Cooper. It was the first in the new colony and several others emerged after the success in Doonholm.

After the end of First World War, Watson stopped his construction business and settled to farm on a portion of his 5,000 acres. His brother Andrew took the rest and named it Braemar Farm.

With droughts, fires, ticks, lions and loans Doonholm was a troubled venture in 1940s. Watson was also ailing and Nick had to leave the war to manage the farm.

“With Doonholm’s Land Bank loan incurring an eight percent interest rate, the need to clear debt became very apparent to Nick. In 1948, Doonholm was registered as a Limited Company and about a third the Farm’s land was sold to a Polish firm. Further income was generated by leasing land. Singh and Patel, respectively, commenced quarrying either side of the river that same year,” writes family member H.K Watson. “Any dreams JK and Nell may have had of being finally rewarded for their investment in Doonholm, of being free of the Land Bank loan, of enjoying their grandchildren, and of a sedate retirement, would have been repeatedly shattered over the next few years. From 1950 the Farm’s viability was repeatedly, increasingly compromised by Nairobi’s rapid industrial and infrastructural expansion.”

In 1950, Doonholm and Braemer lost most of their land  after it was acquired by the government to build Embakasai Airport. The land on which JKIA also sits belonged to Doonholm Farm. They were paid £8 per acre.

Watson’s death in 1955 marked the beginning of the end of Doonholm Farm. The agitation for independence was in top gear and the State of Emergency was on. There were cash flow problems and in 1960 the government summarily acquired more land from Doonholm to widen Doonholm Road and build a feed off to Lunga Lunga Road.

By this time, the farm was being managed by Nick, Watson’s last born son, and who had trained at Kabete Veterinary Laboratories  as a Stock Inspector.

As independence approached, Nick decided that it was time to leave. Most of the family members had settled in South Africa. But he stayed on as a pig farmer which increased the farms potential, but not for long.

In 1966, the MP for Machakos West (Kilungu), William Malu bought the remaining 1554 acres £18,000.

Nick’s son established a tree nursery in South Africa known as Doonholm Nursery (www.doonholm.com) and from where he continues the family’s farming tradition.

In east Africa, Watson is however remembered for the early churches he built especially  Namirembe Hill church in Uganda and the various buildings in Nairobi.

After independence, the name Doonhom was adopted for the new Constituency and Mwai Kibaki represented the area in parliament. It was later changed to Bahati (and later Makadara) while Doonholm Road was renamed Jogoo Road.

While Watson’s name is little known, his Doonholm Estate still lives on – but now as a residential estate.

END NOTE: I would like to thank Douglas and Hellen Watson, the grandchildren of J.K Watson, for availing information and pictures from their family scrapbook: H K Watson, (2019), DOONHOLM Farm: A Pictorial History, pgs 1-21. email: lewson2012@gmail.com.