Alderman Enoch Priestley, the local politician who was honoured for posterity by having St Enoch's Road named after him, came to a tragic and ironic end.

The man behind so many of Bradford's municipal transport improvements at the start of the 20th century was chairman of the Corporation Tramways Committee when, on a foggy afternoon on February 2, 1926, he was struck by a train near Hammerton Street and died instantly. He was 71.

The Bradford Daily Telegraph the following day reported that "The body was discovered at 3.30 by Guard Briggs, who was going along the line from Stanningley to Bradford. Both legs and both arms were injured and there were serious injuries to the head."

So how on earth did it happen? Why was a senior figure on Bradford City Council wandering about on the railway line? Those were questions the Bradford Daily Telegraph tried to answer.

"How exactly the occident occurred is a mystery," admitted the report. "The spot where the body was found was just at the Bradford extremity of a sharp curve. The afternoon was very dark and foggy, and the visibility at this particular spot, which is close to several engine sheds and shunting yards which produce a good deal of smoke, was very bad indeed.

"Mr Priestley had been to the Hammerton Street depot of the Bradford Corporation Cleansing Department and having some occasion to call on the goods yard, which was on the opposite side of the main line rather nearer Bradford, he was making his way down the side of the line.

"Alderman Priestley was an eggs and butter merchant, and he often paid visits to the goods yard in the course of his business, and it had, in fact, been his custom to use this particular route for many years."

The body had been spotted by the fireman of the London King's Cross express which left Exchange Station at 3pm. On arrival at Wakefield he wired the station master at St Dunston's, the nearest station to the accident, to say he had seen it on the main down line near Hammerton Street. The station master dashed to the scene but Guard Briggs had already found the body. A doctor was called and Alderman Priestley was pronounced dead.

The report continued: "All engines were examined, including the engine of the Pullman which passed the spot shortly after 3 o'clock, but there was no sign of any engine having struck any person."

The following morning the minute bell at the Town Hall was tolling and flags were flying at half mast in honour of the local worthy who left two unmarried daughters (his wife and son had died before him).

The newspaper noted: "Only a few hours before his death the late Alderman was at a meeting of the Finance and General Purposes Committee, where he jocularly remarked to a friend, in response to a complaint, that he would see that the lights on the tops of trams running up to Lidget Green were improved."

And so ended the life and career of a man who had been born in Wibsey in 1854, the son of eggs and butter merchant Isaac Priestley. He had taken over the business at the age of 16 after his father died and had involved himself so wholeheartedly in the life of his home village that he had become known as the "Mayor of Wibsey" even before he was elected to Bradford Council in 1889.

As chairman of the Transport Committee, reported the Bradford Daily Telegraph, "he had to deal with probably more criticism and questioning than any other chairman of committee, but never once was he unequal to the occasion; in fact he gained quite a reputation for disposing of an awkward question in a manner which pacified if it did not actually give satisfaction to the questioner. For tact he had not an equal in the whole of the council."

The report concluded: "The distressing fatality will bring deep sorrow into every circle in which the Alderman moved, particularly in his native Wibsey. His death will be no less felt in the City Council, where his picturesque frame, good-natured humour and sincerity of purpose in all things connected with the Corporation had long come to be regarded as inseparable parts of local civic life."

Which, all in all, isn't a bad way to be remembered.