A £1M super-surgery in Darlington is to be named after the man who prevented it from being the "dirtiest town between London and Edinburgh".

A competition to name the medical centre in King Street has been won by local historian George Flynn, who selected the name Dr Piper House, in memory of the town's first medical officer of health.

Chairwoman of Darlington Primary Care Trust Sandra Pollard told the board that in Victorian times Darlington was known as the dirtiest town on the post road between London and Edinburgh.

It had many narrow yards with little light, fresh air, clean water, lavatories or sewage systems.

In 1841, Dr Stephen Edward Piper started work in the town and became Joseph Pease's doctor and the official surgeon of the North Eastern Railway Company.

In 1850, he was appointed as Darlington's first Medical Officer of Health, and the following year produced a report about the health in the poorer areas of Darlington.

It read: "At present numerous dwellings are surrounded by fetid cesspools, abominable pig sties, open dunghills, dirty ditches and ponds of stagnant water so that the ground is literally saturated with these filthy oozings which often percolate into springs and wells contaminating the water, or intrude through the adjoining houses staining the walls with offensive moisture."

The report led to a clean-up of the town, and Dr Piper arranged for doctors to visit every family and for chloride of lime to be distributed to kill germs.

He was opposed to the town centre graveyards and his work led to the creation of West Cemetery, as well as the opening of Darlington crematorium in 1900.

Dr Piper is also credited with cleaning up the River Skerne, opening South Park to the public and ensuring a town hospital and public baths were constructed.

Primary care trust staff are expected to move into Dr Piper House on April 15.

The refurbished building will be the headquarters for the trust. Later this year a medical walk-in centre and clinic for skin services and minor surgery will be opened in the building.