Bruised feet were no obstacle for one couple who are celebrating 50 happy years together.

Former Witney mayor Ted Cooper, 74, and his wife Jean, 72, will be celebrating their golden wedding anniversary with their family this weekend.

The couple, who live in Blakes Avenue, met at a British Legion dance in Burton on the Water in 1956.

Mr Cooper said: "She said they're all under 17 or over 70 here', and she was about to go when I asked her to get up.

"Of course I stepped all over her, because I wasn't much of a dancer.

"That was the start of it."

Six months later - 50 years ago today - Mr Cooper and Miss Longworth, as she was, married in Cirencester.

Mr Cooper said: "It was very good, exciting, lovely."

But it was not all plain sailing, according to Mr Cooper.

He said: "A week after we got married I was rushed into Cheltenham General with apendicitis - I blamed it on mother's chocolate cake."

The couple have three children, Barry, 47, Belinda, 45, and Jeannette, 40, and six grandchildren.

Mrs Cooper, who was a cashier until she had to give up work due to back problems, said the key to a good marriage was "hard work".

Mr Cooper, an inspector at Smith Industry, as well as a councillor for 16 years, added: "It isn't what you can get out of it, it's what you can put into it.

"Be sincere.

"That's what it amounts to, and you've got to love each other and want to be there.

"We have never looked at anything else or wanted anything else."=