A REPLICA of a little piece of village history is to return after a 60-year absence.

A copy of the 19th Century drinking fountain which once stood at the centre of Shotley Bridge is to be installed at a new location in the village in the spring as the centrepoint of a series of improvements carried out in recent months.

The original pant was built in 1886 at the junction of Front Street and Snows Green Road to mark the arrival of piped water in the County Durham village.

However, it was removed in the early 1950s to make way for a road widening scheme and, after many years in council depot storage, is now in Beamish Museum, where it stands on the edge of the town.

Now a £15,000 replica, complete with four drinking basins, is to be installed at a new site on Front Street, across the road from Rumi’s restaurant, and is to be unveiled at a village celebration event planned for March.

The return of the pant follows years of work by Shotley Bridge Village Trust and local councillors.

Cllr Stephen Robinson, who represents the village on Durham County Council, said: “The drinking fountain stood outside the bank on the corner, but was taken out not long after the war to help traffic get round the bend.

“It went into storage for a long, long time which is quite sad”.

He added: “It was a historic part of the village, it was unfortunate that the original went to Beamish Museum because we couldn’t get it back.

“This is an exact copy of the old drinking fountain and we needed a more suitable location for it, so we held talks and came up with this site which is council-owned land.

“We want to bring the pant back home.”

Funding for the scheme has come from a £125,000 fund paid for by developers of housing on the Shotley Bridge Hospital site.

Some of the funding has already paid for new lampposts, paving and flowerbeds throughout the village as well as renewing the old stone-built bus shelters.

A paved area with new walls and seating has already been prepared ready for the replica pant, which is being created by North Shields-based renovation experts Classic Masonry Ltd.

To mark the pant’s return, the Village Trust plans to publish a 32-page booklet telling the history of Shotley Bridge, including its famous sword-making and spa heritage.