Platinum celebration for beautiful couple
FROM sheep, to crops and on to chocolates and coast retirement, George and Ethne Hannaford gave up farming for the sweet life.
After many years cropping and running livestock between Stanthorpe and Texas and later at Cambooya, the Hannafords upped stakes and bought a confectionery business at the Gold Coast.
The business, The Chocolate Kingdom, specialised in handmade chocolates.
This month marked the couple’s 70th anniversary.
They were married at St Margaret’s Anglican Church at Sandgate on February 4, 1950.
After their marriage they lived on the Hannaford family property ‘St Omer’.
There was no telephone, so Mr Hannaford and his neighbours installed army phones and were able to keep in touch for emergencies and help each other with shopping.
Later, the men built a ‘party’ telephone line to Silver Spur and the PMG (now Telstra) paid for a connection to Texas.
“George’s father Stanley gave the land for a bowling club to be established in Texas and George helped to get it started,” Mrs Hannaford said.
Mr Hannaford was a shire councillor for Stanthorpe and a Charter member of the Stanthorpe Lions Club.
“We grew wheat and barley at ‘St Omer’ and we had the first harvester in the area as well as the sheep,” Mrs Hannaford said.
“We were interested in growing crops in a 26-inch rainfall country, which wasn’t enough.
“We were taken with the Clifton area and the good crops grown there, so in 1967 we decided to look for property selling in that area.
“We ended up selling ‘St Omer’ later that year, and after a caravanning holiday, and returned to Toowoomba early in 1968.
“Soon after, we bought ‘Coverham Vale’, Cambooya, which was only 15 miles from the city centre with such good roads.
For many years, Mr Hannaford was secretary of the local Graingrowers’ Association, Warden of All Saints Anglican Church, a councillor and later chairman of the Cambooya Shire Council.
Mrs Hannaford was very involved with the CWA in various positions, the Toowoomba Historical Society and the All Saints Church Guild.
Both were on the committee to run the local sports days and gymkhanas.
At the end of 1984 they sold up and moved to the Gold Coast, where they learnt the art of chocolate making.
Mr Hannaford also kept busy as the founding president of the Gold Coast Unit Owners’ Association, holding the position for almost a decade.
Life certainly didn’t slow down too much over the past 10 years as the Hannafords threw themselves into life at their retirement village, including being active on the Home Committee and Constitution as well as participating in plenty of group activities.
It wasn’t all smooth sailing though, with upsets coming in the form of a case of mistaken identity when talk got around that their son Ian was involved in an unsolved murder case and another when their eldest son Jeff was coward punched at a hotel, causing huge impacts on his life.
Resilient as ever though, the happy couple’s celebration of their platinum wedding anniversary was highlighted by the opening of congratulatory cards from the Queen, the Governor-general, the Prime Minister and other dignitaries.