A COUPLE who have been inseparable ever since they met in a pub in Worcester city centre more than 50 years ago are celebrating their golden wedding today.

Jean Newman said: “It must’ve been love at first sight” when she caught the attention of her husband-to-be Geoff as she played games in the City Arms, Church Street, which no longer exists, on April 16, 1957.

Mrs Newman, who was 17 years old at the time, said they saw each other practically every night from then on and got married at Holy Trinity Church in Worcester on this date 50 years ago.

But Mr Newman, who was a 20-year-old apprentice plumber living in Evesham back then, said the wedding nearly didn’t happen. “I saved up all of my money for the wedding within a fortnight,” he said. “I used to use it on snooker. I used to go straight into the club and nine times out of 10 I would come out skint.”

However, the wedding passed off without a problem and the couple, of Ambleside Drive, Brickfields, Worcester, celebrated the arrival of their first child, Jane, in 1959.

Sue was born 14 months later before Teresa arrived in 1967, and Belinda in 1971. Mrs Newman then had the unusual experience of carrying her fifth child, Donna, at the same time Sue was pregnant in 1978.

Mr and Mrs Newman, who also have 16 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren, said their family was a credit to them and helped during difficult times.

Mrs Newman said her husband, a talented singer and footballer in his youth who helped set up Worcester-based painting and decorating firm TCG, had an anuerism about six years ago. “He actually died on the table and came back,” she said.

Mr Newman, now aged 71, said his wife, an avid bingo player who used to work as a barmaid at The Lakes, Ambleside Drive, in the 1970s had helped him a lot.

“She has been a brick for me and she is one of the fittest women I know,” he said. “She’s 68 and she can still do hand stands, skipping, and run. She walks nearly everywhere she goes, that’s how fit she is.”

Mr Newman said friendship had been the key to their marriage’s success.