DERWENT Reservoir celebrated its half century last week and to mark the occasion, one of the key engineers in its construction was invited for a special presentation.

Fifty years earlier, Neil Buchanan was chosen to guide HRH Princess Alexandra around the new £5.5m scheme and his and the princess’s were the very first signatures in the reservoir’s visitors’ book.

This week, Mr Buchanan, who was 90 earlier this month, travelled from his home in Ponteland, where he lives with his wife, Dorothy, to revisit one of his biggest civil engineering triumphs and to receive that same visitors’ book as a lasting family heirloom.

“Neil is one of the world’s pioneering dam designers of the modern dam construction style and we felt it would be fitting for his to be the first and last signature in the book,” said Northumbrian Water’s Kevin Miller, Derwent’s current supervising engineer.

Mr Buchanan also received two framed letters from Princess Alexandra, one sent after her visit and the latest one dated earlier this month, in which she sends her good wishes to Mr Buchanan and recalls “fond memories” of her visit in 1967 “and of the delightful silver ink stand” she received.

Speaking after the presentation, Mr Buchanan was keen to point out the contribution made by his fellow engineers and the construction team.

“I was just one of the designers of Derwent and I can’t take credit from my colleagues Nigel Ruffle and Roy Hollis. Andrew McLellan was also the very enlightened general manager of what was then the Sunderland and South Shields Water Company.”

He added that he was very proud that Derwent was awarded a Civic Trust award. “We were very careful and did a lot of planting of trees round the reservoir to allow it to fit in and we worked really really hard to make it something that was of value to the community, both as an amenity and as a source of leisure.”

He said he felt honoured by Tuesday’s presentation. “It was absolutely marvellous because it came out of the blue,” he said.

Mr Miller added: “Neil worked on many Northumbrian Water Group projects in design and supervision after Derwent, including Kielder Dam, Lumley Water Treatment Works and the first River Tyne sewerage improvement scheme.”