BRIDPORT: A couple are celebrating a landmark anniversary.
Tom and Vera Brown, of Hibernia Close, Bridport will mark their 65th wedding anniversary with a party attended by friends and family, and the couple’s favourite, a fish and chip dinner.
Mr Brown, 89, put the secret of a happy marriage down to ‘having lots in common’.
He said: “We like the same things, such as going to the bingo, which always helps as we have lots to talk about. We keep busy and we’re always off out of the house doing something. Of course we have arguments, like every couple, but mostly she tells me what to do, and I do it, which helps a lot.”
The couple met at Bridport fair nearly 70 years ago when Mrs Brown, now 85, was just 16. Mrs Brown was born in Bridport and Mr Brown settled in the town after being evacuated during the war.
Describing herself as ‘the rowdy one’, she said she remembers seeing a ‘shy and innocent’ sailor and asked him to get on the back of her carousel horse. The pair courted for four years and married at St Mary’s Church in South Street on August 27, 1949. Mr Brown was in the Royal Navy when they met and served in the Fleet Air Arm in the north Atlantic before returning to Bridport.
Mrs Brown found work as a chef at the Sir John Colfox School and Mr Brown worked as a Calor gas vendor throughout the country. The couple will celebrate with friends and family, including their son and daughter, six grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
Mr Brown said: “We have two grandchildren in China, but they are coming back to the UK soon after three months there.
“We are going to go and see them in Cheltenham when they’re back, so we’re looking forward to that.”