Peter Dorman

After leaving school in Barnsley at a young age to work as a joiner for a small firm, Peter was offered an unexpected opportunity to become a QS with the same employer. He never looked back. Despite the day, evening and late-night study involved in picking up the necessary qualifications, Peter set to work on his chosen path with considerable gusto.

A move to local government followed and a hop north to Wakefield City Council as a senior QS. Peter soon got his first taste of management as he progressed to the role of team leader.

He went on to enjoy a successful stint at West Riding County Council, also in Wakefield, before heading back to his roots to take up the position of chief quantity surveyor with South Yorkshire County Council.

When his employer was abolished under the reorganisation of 1986, Peter decided to leave local government and become self-employed. He also helped found Dimension Five, a construction consultancy which may have been mistaken for a club act.

Peter would go on to spend many happy years working as a freelance QS at the racing stables at Rossington Hall, near Doncaster, at what is now the Northern Racing College. If he picked up any surefire tips, his wallet didn't appear to fatten.

During his long career, Peter served as president of the Yorkshire Institute of Quantity Surveyors.

Despite never leaving these shores until he was 50, he made up for the delay by taking his wife Esther far and wide in their semi and

permanent retirement. America became a regular haunt, although they also took in Canada, Australia, China, Hong Kong, Russia and Yugoslavia.

Peter was a dab hand at table tennis, starting at Barnsley Boys Club and still playing competitively in his mid sixties. He may have had a steady, unspectacular style, but he also had a good brain for the game, a sharp eye and the most annoying, well-disguised short serve ever.

Above all though, except his family, Peter liked fishing and he enjoyed many, many hours casting, watching and catching at Bretton Hall, on the River Wharfe and well out to sea off Staithes.

Ill health robbed Peter of the pleasure of rod and reel in later life, but he still indulged his love of the great outdoors by taking his six grandchildren on walks in pram or buggy at every conceivable opportunity.

A man of great warmth, generosity, compassion and selflessness, Peter leaves the love of his life, Esther, his wife of 58 years, brother

Kevin, sister Nancy and three children, Hilary, Chris and Howard.