Lifelong Squamish residents Jo and Owen Reeve are defying the odds in more ways than one. Three children, seven grandchildren and nine great grandchildren after they were married, the couple is celebrating 70 years of matrimony on Tuesday (May 31).
To commemorate the occasion, friends and family are attending a celebration because, as their daughter Lorraine Scheidemen puts it, "70 years married is quite a feat!"
Jo said the decision was made somewhat on a whim.
"I asked Owen, 'Don't you think we deserve a celebration,' and he said, 'Yes,' so we're doing it," she said. The celebration will take place at St. John's Anglican Church on June 4 from 1:30 to 4 p.m. Friends and family are invited to attend.
Jo, 88, and Owen, 95, were married in 1941 in the Christ Church Cathedral in downtown Vancouver. But only one year later, Owen had to enlist for World War II and spent four years as a foot soldier in Italy. Looking back, they agree it was one of the hardest trials in their 70 years together.
"I wrote him a letter every day," she said. "That's how I remember his serial number so well."
Owen said he would receive the letters "every week or so, a bunch at once," and that's what kept him going during his time in the Signal Corps.
Jo and Owen's first daughter was born while Owen was overseas, and he said he held her for the first time at three years old when he finally returned.
"It was very lonely," said Jo, "and I was always worried until he came home."
The couple has been through good and tough times since then, but their marriage never wavered.
"You get to know a person pretty well after so long," Jo said. "You deal with everything and anything that comes your way together - kids, jobs, houses, illness, everything"
Owen said despite the changes that inevitably take place in a relationship, there is one constant.
"I guess things change as we get older," said Owen. "But not the love."
However, the couple didn't say it was all easy.
"A lot of times it's tough" began Jo.
"But we managed to get through them all," added Owen. "We hung together through good times and bad."
Jo said she doesn't envy the complexity of relationships today. For her, there was no question she and Owen would be together for their whole lives because that's what they promised on their wedding day.
"Nowadays, relationships are much more complicated," said mused. "Young people just live so differently"
Jo and Owen said relationships aren't the only aspect they've seen change.
"When we were born just a handful of people lived here," Owen said. "My dad worked as the telegraph operator because there were no telephones."
He said there used to be wooden sidewalks and "every time there was a flood, they would be floating all over town."
Owen, who spent much of his younger years working for the railway, saw the rise and decline of the logging and railway industry firsthand.
"The type of job and the type of people who live here has changed a lot," he said. "It's a completely different town than the one we grew up in."
Jo and Owen said they think Squamish is getting a little too big, but it will always be home to them.
