Diamond delight

FOR Stanley and Jean Hill tolerance is the key to a lasting marriage.

The Holmfirth couple have just celebrated 60 years of marriage with a party for family and friends.

The couple, who met on a Holme Valley farm, wed on December 15, 1956.

Mr Hill, now 83, was brought up on a farm and knew the farmer over at Hollingreave where he met his wife when they were teenagers.

He said: “It was five years before I proposed, I took my time as we were only young. I was 18 when we met and Jean was 16.”

He wed Jean, now 80, at New Mill Church with a reception at the village club and a London honeymoon.

Mr Hill left school at 14 and did various jobs before working at Park Mill Colliery in Clayton West for 20 years.

In the 1950s he also played for Underbank, joining the open-age team when he was 17.

He later became a well-known face in the Holme Valley, as he worked for 24 years as a postman.

Mrs Hill was a typist on Chapel Hill and also worked in retail.

The couple have two daughters, Beverley and Lorraine, four granddaughters and four greatgranddaughters.

Asked what the secret to a happy marriage is, Mrs Hill said: “Tolerance, it has to work both ways.

“We’ve had a lovely diamond celebration.”