AT 91, Connie Ayre is the sort of person we'd all hope to be when we grow up. Her mind's as sharp as a tack, she's smartly dressed, and modestly amused at her sudden 15 minutes of fame. "Oh yes, I'm getting a very swollen head," she says.

It's all to do with her student dissertation on Upper Weardale. She wrote it 70 years ago when she was studying for a BSc in Geography at Armstrong College, Newcastle. As Armstrong College, then part of Durham, became King's College and then the University of Newcastle, the dissertation lay in the basement, undisturbed until last year. Prompted by Mrs Ayre's son in law, David Budgen, the university sent her a 90th birthday card. Then they looked in their records and in the basement, found the dissertation and presented it to Connie.

It's a work of art, 150 typed pages with hand-drawn graphs and maps and tiny black and white photographs. It is itself a snapshot of the dale in the years just before the Second World War. And now it's going to a new home in Killhope Lead Mining Museum as a valuable and unique record.

The story made Connie briefly famous. Her picture was in the papers, she was interviewed on Radio 4, delighting listeners and sparking a lively debate on its web pages.

"I never knew so many people listened. People keep stopping me when I'm going to the shops," she says at her home in Stanhope. "But it was all a bit strange because, of course, when I wrote my dissertation all those years ago, I handed it in and then really forgot all about it."

Although born in Rutland, Connie grew up in Bishop Auckland. Her father, a local preacher and pacifist worked in and then owned Murray's shoe shop. The family lived over the shop and Connie went to the girls' grammar school when it was under the headship of Dr Fisher, who must have been a remarkable character.

"We never thought it was strange that girls like us should go to university," says Connie. "Dr Fisher was an exceptional woman, ahead of her time. She just assumed that if we had the brains to go, then go we would. Quite a few girls from our school went. The council gave us grants, of course, otherwise we couldn't have afforded it. In those days the Geography department was just in a tin hut. We didn't have all the wonderful facilities they have these days, but I was very lucky to have the chance."

Connie chose Upper Weardale as her research project simply because she knew it well - her father preached there regularly, they had trips and treats up the dale. And it was sheer coincidence that she came to live there when she married after the war.

During the war, she taught in school Tynemouth and had a wonderful time. "At that age, you never think you'll be the one to get bombed."

Then she met Charles Ayre, who came to teach French at Wolsingham. They moved to Stanhope and Connie still lives in the same house. Ironically, in her dissertation she noted the number of retired people living in Stanhope. She's been one of their number for more than 30 years now.

"Of course, I had to give up work when we moved here, because married women weren't allowed to teach. Doesn't that seem ridiculous now?"

But the rules changed and after her daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, started school, she was able to teach three days a week herself.

"Three days is perfect for a working mother," she says. "I defy any woman to do a full day's work, look after a family and then have time for herself. And the family is important. 'The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world' we used to say. It's all about the children really."

Connie was - is still - an enthusiastic member of the Methodist church and of the WI.

"We used to do a lot of craft work and competitions and had a choir. There's not so much going on now because people are busier and have less time and the WI has to adapt to suit its members, but I still enjoy going."

Connie's out and about nearly every day - "You have to keep yourself busy and interested. You can't just stay in all the time" - gave up driving only when her eyesight got too bad and, until recently, regularly went over to Canada to visit her daughter Margaret and family there. She's an enthusiastic supporter of the just re-opened Weardale Railway.

"It's a beautiful line. It will be good to see trains along it again," she says, producing a timetable for me.

Connie's been very happy in Weardale. "Stanhope is the perfect place to live, just the right size." But the conclusion of her dissertation all those years ago was that the dale was in decline. Now, with the closure of the cement works, it seems as though that decline could be accelerating.

"Not at all," says Connie, robustly. "I think it's more a case of change. Back in the 1930s tourism wasn't important, but now it's the coming thing. We have plenty of lovely scenery and the railway is just the thing to bring people in.

"I'm very optimistic about the future of the Dale and I hope to be here until I'm at least 100 so that I can see it."

* Connie's dissertation will be on show at the museum on August 14, or you can make an appointment to have a look at it in the Friends of Killhope Archive.

* Killhope Lead Mining Museum, which won the Guardian's Family Friendly Museum Award in 2003, is open daily until the end of October, 10.30am to 5.30pm. Call (01388) 537505 for details.