York couple celebrate 70 years of marriage and aiming for UK record
Peter and Noreen over the summer (Image: Provided)
AN EAST Yorkshire couple whose love story has taken them from Skirlaugh to Sumatra are celebrating 70 years of marriage today.
Peter and Noreen Hodgson – who are 92 and 91 and live together in York city centre – are marking their platinum anniversary today (September 29) after seven decades married.
The pair first met at a village dance in the East Yorkshire village of Skirlaugh with local boy Peter finding himself taken with Noreen, who hails from nearby Halsham.
- First headline act announced for York Museum Gardens summer series 2027
- 'I am incredibly proud' - new York school celebrates first Ofsted inspection
He said: “She came to the dance and I decided to ask if I could take her home, so I had to go home and get my bike then cycle back to her village with her.”
Noreen added: “After that, I started nursing in Hull and invited him to come along to a hospital concert where I was involved with doing a dance. I think he must have been fascinated with that, because we continued on together.”
Their relationship blossomed from there, with the pair making their union official on September 29, 1956, by marrying in Swine Church in East Yorkshire.
After their wedding, the couple moved to Manchester, where Noreen worked as a district nurse and Peter began his career with Shell – a job which took them across the world to South Sumatra in Indonesia in 1958.
Peter and Noreen in Indonesia (Image: Provided)
Peter said: “Not long after we got married, President Sukarno in Indonesia banished all Dutch people from the country and as you can imagine, Royal Dutch Shell employed a lot of people from the Netherlands.
“They had an urgent need to switch out their staff for non-Dutch people, so I was one of those selected.
“There were massive restrictions at the time, so we were very limited on where we could go, what we could do, and we had to eat locally, so it made for some interesting times. It was pretty basic, but it was an experience for us.”
Noreen added: “We were only in our early 20s at the time. I sailed on my own whilst they flew out Peter – it took me six weeks at sea to get there.
Peter and Noreen in Indonesia (Image: Provided)
“Life was just so tough out there and we had so little, so we had these wild parties and we certainly made the most of it.
“We had a shipwreck themed party and there was the circus party where it was a dressing up night. Peter was a clown and I was a trapeze artist; it was just such a fun night.”
They lived in Indonesia for three years before returning to the UK, where the pair raised two sons - Mike and John - whilst Peter left Shell and proceeded to create a string of his own pioneering businesses across the oil, photography, and recycling sectors.
Peter (Image: Provided)
Outside of work, both Peter and Noreen have remained active and are entirely self-sufficient.
They shared a passion for golf and continued the sport well into their 80s, whilst also enjoying individual hobbies of marathon running and dance.
They’ve also travelled widely: visiting America multiple times through work, moving across the UK (before returning to York 12 years ago), and spending months in Australia visiting son Mike.
They also have grandchildren living across the world from Canada to Vietnam, something which the pair say makes them 'so proud' with Peter adding that he loves to see his children and grandchildren 'do their own thing'.
On the secret of their long marriage, Noreen said: “Lots of fun and lots of laughter. We’re really lucky to still have each other. We’ve had 70 wonderful years together."
Noreen (Image: Provided)
Peter added: “We’ve also got a lot in common and we are friends all way – we have a common sense of humour, we get on well, and obviously, we still love each other.
“We also follow the advice given to us by our vicar on their wedding day - never go to bed and let the sun go down upon your wrath.
"I think we've stayed with that - we never go to bed angry and we always share a goodnight kiss and an 'I love you'.”
To celebrate their anniversary, Peter and Noreen enjoyed a meal with family over the weekend, with son John adding that his parents are truly ‘phenomenal’ and that he hopes they will be able to challenge the UK record of 84 years of marriage.