Love is still in the air (From Warrington Guardian)

Love is still in the air

A DEVOTED Runcorn couple this week celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary. Harry Chapman, 94, and his wife Gertrude, 96, are now possibly the longest married couple alive in Britain.

They live at Beechcroft Care Home in Palacefields and, amazingly, neither of them has had a serious illness.

Care home manager, Kathleen Ridings, said: "It's amazing that they are both still here to tell their tales."

Harry and Gertrude did sequence dancing three or four times a week right through to their 80s and have danced for the staff at the home.

Harry even used to go under his Lada car and fix it when he was 88!

Their only son, Donald, 74, came to visit with his wife Marjory yesterday (Tuesday) for a champagne celebration - Gertrude even had her hair specially done for the occasion.

Harry said they were still together because: "You have got to work together to live together. You should sort it all out as best you can."

They lived in Lowmoor in Bradford and married when she was 21 and he was 19, on February 2, 1929, just before the great depression.

Donald said: "When they first married there was no money at all.

"My father didn't have a job, it was hard going. Charities and other people had to give them half a crown just for food."

They met when Gertrude was a servant in a large house and Harry worked in a supermarket.

At the time, the boys and girls used to parade past each other on opposite sides of the street on a Sunday night to see who they liked.

During the war, Harry served in the UK with the Kings Liverpool Regiment while Gertrude worked in a mill.

Afterwards he became a painter and decorator and she was a housewife.

They later moved to Sutton Weaver and then came to Beechcroft.

These days Gertrude is deaf and can't talk, and Harry needs a wheelchair to get around properly.

They used to visit the nearby Tricorn Pub on special occasions until recently.

The couple has two grand children, three great grand children and three great, great grand children.

Mrs Ridings joked: "Harry likes to relax in his room while Gertrude walks round the home as if she owns it. We know who was the boss in the family!"

But Donald added: "Harry was always really in charge, my mother made a lot of noise but deep down we knew who the boss was!"

And he said the care the couple had received from Beechcroft was "absolutely wonderful".

The longest married couple in the world are a Taiwanese couple at 85 years.

In 1998, a Yorkshire couple who had been married for 76 years were thought to be the British record holders.