Bransgore couple John and Jean Harrison share platinum anniversary with Queen

A CHANCE meeting on a bus led to 70 years of happy married life for John and Jean Harrison who have celebrated their platinum wedding anniversary.

Jean (89), who was only 17 at the time, said: “I was getting on a bus in Mudeford where I lived to go to a dance in Bournemouth.

“John was on the bus, and he later told me he’d noticed me straight away. At the dance he came up to chat and ask me to dance.

“I thought he was very nice and looked very good. That was it, really!”

The couple, from Bransgore, dated for two years before tying the knot on 15th March at Christchurch Priory when Jean was 19 and John 27.

John (96) revealed: “When I saw Jean on the bus I thought, ‘She’s just my type’ and so she was.

“We have had the most marvellous marriage.”

Their wedding was at the priory but it was not a lavish affair. Jean said: “We had the reception at the Salisbury Arms in Purewell, which I think cost my father all of a fiver!“I’ve been making up for it ever since by celebrating our anniversary with a proper party.”

The couple were due to be the guests of honour at a family celebration hosted by their daughter Julie Wallom but unfortunately her own daughter caught Covid.

Instead, their granddaughter and her partner and their two-week-old baby Harrison, who is John and Jean’s first great-grandchild, will be visiting them for a celebration.

Jean and John were treated to a night at the Harbour Hotel in Mudeford with breakfast and dinner to celebrate.

John said: “We are going to sit on the terrace and enjoy a drink while looking at the house on Mudeford quay where Jean was born.”

When they met Jean was working as a shorthand typist at a garage in Purewell. She later worked at building societies in Bournemouth and Highcliffe.

John saw service with the Royal Engineers during World War 2 as a draughtsman which he continued as when he was demobbed, only retiring at 84.

The couple had two children born in the 1960s, Nigel and Julie. They now have four grandchildren.

John puts the secret of their happy life together down to “never letting an argument last”, adding: “We try not to argue and if we do it’s over in five minutes.”

The couple said they were as much in love now as they were at the beginning, and were thrilled to get a congratulations card from the Queen.

Jean said: “It is nice to think we are celebrating our platinum anniversary in her platinum jubilee year.”

Nigel said of his parents: “My sister and I are extremely lucky to have a mother and father whom we can look up to in so many ways.

“Firstly, to get to their 50th and 60th wedding anniversaries seemed remarkable but to get to 70 and still be fit in mind and body is really something.

“Secondly, I can’t remember ever seeing them have an argument or dispute, nor a cross word with one another. In a time when divorce and single parents are commonplace it seems astonishing to go that long without even a quarrel.

“Finally, although my mother will claim that dad has never said he loves her – I think it’s true as we have never heard him, there is an enormous amount of admiration and respect between them both.

“They really are true role models for a successful marriage.”