A train is to be named after historian Ian Dewhirst, who is known affectionately as Mr Keighley.

His name will bedeck a Northern Rail 158 diesel unit which will work the Airedale line and throughout the North for the next four years.

The train will also have a new livery of images of Keighley to promote the town and its attractions such as the heritage Worth Valley line and East Riddlesden Hall.

It has been spearheaded and jointly financed by a partnership of Keighley Town Council, the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway, the Bronte Country Partnership and Bradford Council.

It will be launched at a special ceremony at Keighley station on Friday, September 21.

Mr Dewhirst, a 72-year-old retired Keighley reference librarian who is known for his expertise on social history, said he was very proud.

He said: “I was stopped in the street and told by someone from the town centre association they wanted to name a train after me. I was very flattered and said yes. I feel honoured.

“The only other engine I know named after a local person is J Arthur Godwin, the first Lord Mayor of Bradford and of course he’s dead.”

Mr Dewhirst does not drive so he travels by train a lot throughout the region. One of his talks was about the railway coming to Keighley in 1857.

Susan Mendoza, vice-chairman of Keighley Town Centre Association, said Mr Dewhirst was a great ambassador for the town.

Northern Rail have five named trains. They are name after John Axon, a train driver who died preventing a rail tragedy in the 1950s; Benny Rothman, an activist who led the mass trespass at Kinder Pass in 1932; Yorkshire cricketer Fred Trueman; and Alderman J Arthur Godwin, Bradford’s first Lord Mayor.

e-mail: clive.white@telegraphandargus.co.uk