A SENSE of humour and mutual understanding are the secrets to a happy marriage according to one Bardon Mill couple.

Stanley and Marion Prins celebrated their milestone occasion on New Year’s Eve in the very place they held their wedding reception.

The couple, joined by family and friends, returned to Featherstone Castle which is owned by Marion’s family, where they had celebrated their union 50 years previously. The couple were married at on the last day of 1965.

Marion said: “We remember our wedding fondly. It was a big family affair. It was rather special.”

Stanley agreed: “Everyone thought getting married on New Year’s Eve was very romantic.”

They spent their honeymoon in Austria. Marion laughed as she recalls how they pretended to know how to ski – apparently they weren’t very good.

The pair met in their 20s at college in Newcastle, which was then part of Durham University.

Stanley was reading botany and natural sciences, and Marion was reading social sciences.

They were both members of the Student Christian Movement and fast became good friends.

Stanley said: “We got on so well because we had so many common interests. It was our interests that brought us together.”

Their romance was a slow-burner. After graduating Stanley went to do National Service in Malaya, and Marion worked for the Student Christian Movement in London.

They remained good friends and regularly wrote to each other.

On Stanley’s return to England he took up a place at theological college at Ripon Hall, Oxford.

He then went on to work as a vicar in Benwell and Marion subsequently returned to Newcastle to work as a psychiatric social worker.

Now both back in Newcastle it wasn’t long before they were engaged and then married.

Stanley was appointed the first vicar at Chapel House, in Newcastle, and it was there they started a family.

The couple have three children – Lucinda, Katherine and Simon – and five grandchildren.

Ten years later they moved to Humshaugh, where Stanley was vicar of Humshaugh, Simonburn and Wark.

Marion credits their 20 years in the parish as having some of their precious memories.

“We loved being in the North Tyne. It was wonderful to bring up our children in the countryside,” she said.

“There’s a real community feel there and the vicarage was a lovely family home.”

They celebrated their wedding anniversary with a family dinner at Featherstone Castle.

With family living in York, Durham and Fort William, it is rare that they can all get together.

They credit their long-lasting marriage to “mutual support and affection”.

Stanley said: “We’re really good friends and we just get on.”