Couple who met as teen apprentices celebrate 60th wedding anniversary
A couple who first met as teenage apprentices working at a Black Country glass factory have celebrated their 60th wedding.
Terry and Anne Wooldridge, aged 80 and 79, toasted the grand occasion with a family meal at their daughter Kerry Groves' house.
The pair met aged 16 and 15 at Stuart Glass in Wordsley, Dudley, where Mr Wooldridge was bet "half a crown" he wouldn't take her out.
"We were apprentices," he said. "The boys were on one side and the girls on another. We were separated by a partition.
"A girl came round and said 'will you go out with Anne and will meet her outside The Grand'. That was a picture house in Kingswinford.
"She said 'I bet you don't turn up'. Well I never had that half a crown back from Maureen. The rest was history, as they say."
The pair married five years later at Dudley registrar's office on September 10, 1960.
Mr and Mrs Wooldridge, who have three children and three grandchildren, says they have lived a "full life together".
"The secret to our marriage is loving each other every day," said Mr Wooldridge, who lives in Dudley alongside his wife.
During their earlier years, the pair ran a number of pubs including the Railway Vaults in Dudley and The Albion in Pensnett.
Mr Wooldridge also worked as a milkman, a bus driver and drove JCB lorries.
The couple were described as "loving and kind" people by their daughter Kerry, 48.
Their other two children are Karen, 53, and Ricky, 59. Their grandchildren are Rich, 31, Luke, 26, and Tommy, 21.
The family had a get together over the weekend to mark the occasion.
