THE family of a celebrated war veteran attended a street naming ceremony in his honour.

A row of new council houses were unveiled in Darlington named Earl Carlson Grove, in remembrance of war hero and sporting legend Earl Carlson.

Mr Carlson left his home country of Canada and gave up his promising ice hockey career at the age of 17 to fight in the Second World War. He died in 1970.

He was a Canadian airman who flew out of Middleton St George before later founding Durham Wasps ice hockey club.

Mr Carson's two sons Robert and Stuart were in attendance at the ribbon cutting ceremony, officiated by Councillor Bill Dixon, leader of Darlington Borough Council in one of his final duties as leader.

Robert Carlson said: "The whole family feel very proud and I think my dad would have been very proud as well, on the whole we are very happy with the way things have turned out.

"He was wonderful, everybody loved him. I had a young girl come up to me when I was 14 years old, she was about 17 years old and she said do you think your dad would divorce your mam and marry me? Everyone just wanted to be around him all the time."

The war hero followed his brother into the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was a member of the ground crew, stationed at RAF Middleton St George and RAF Croft-on-Tees.

In 1947, Mr Carlson set up the Durham Wasps and became their first captain. He was the first amateur player to score 600 goals and once held the record for the most goals scored in one game which was seven.

His son's wife Rosemary, came up with the idea to name a street after her heroic father-in-law, even though she unfortunately never got to meet him.

Mrs Carlson got in touch with the council about naming a street after her father-in-law. She didn’t tell her husband until Christmas when she photocopied the emails between herself and the council and gave them to him as a Christmas present.

She said: "Robert is so proud of his dad, we have so much memorabilia here, he was quite famous in this time. I just knew it would be a wonderful legacy for him."