TWO lifelong members of Zoar Methodist Chapel are celebrating their diamond wedding on June 2. Jim and Mable Palmer will be celebrating at home with a tea party for friends and family. Both have always lived at Horndon, attending the Methodist Chapel nearby, where Mable has been the organist for 52 years. She is a prolific knitter and also enjoys needlework and embroidery. Jim enjoys gardening and carpentry. He served his apprenticeship as a carpenter and continued in the trade. Both are keen followers of Welsh and local male voice choirs. The couple met when they went to Mary Tavy Primary School together and then on to Dolvin Road Secondary School in Tavistock. Jim said they had been together most of the time since then and the only time they have been apart was for four and a half years during the second world war, when Jim was in the 2nd Devons. They were married at Russell Street Methodist Church in Tavistock on June 2 1948 by the late Rev EC Gimblett. They have a daughter, Hilda, and a son, Russell and three grandchildren and one great-grandson. Jim said that for a marriage to last there needed to be 'give and take' and the couple should be 'straight with one another'.
