A couple who married in 1947 were honoured at the conclusion of the National Marriage Day Mass last Thursday evening in St Mary’s Cathedral for their 63-year commitment to marriage.
John and Irene Fuchsbichler (nee Rattray) of Bruce Rock in WA’s wheatbelt, who have been lifelong farmers, were presented with a special AFA Family Award and later congratulated personally by Archbishop Hickey and other clergy for their commitment to marriage.
John, who will be 94 in November but looks and talks like a man decades younger, told The Record he began farming when he left school at the age of 14.
He and Irene married in St Mary’s Cathedral in 1947; he was 30, she was 18. The couple had five children, three girls and two boys, and the family have been mostly located in and around Bruce Rock for a century. They have 15 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. Irene said she was surprised by the presentation of the certificate, which she had not been expecting at all.