Restore last view upon returning to page

[tedqn]

I have a gridview page that returns result base on submitted search
criteria. Each result has a link to view the details of an item, which
will take user away from the current page to the detail page. From the
detail page, there's a link to go back to the result page. However,
upon coming back, the original result view is reset. How do I make it
so that upon returning to the page, it loads the last view state the
user was in when he left the page (ie. search result, current page
(paging), search criteria)? I know other sites seem to give each state
an id stored in cookies or something that is passed to the detail page
and then back to the result page. With that id, the result page can
then pulls the last view state. TIA.