Phyllis and John celebrate 70 years of marriage

By Georgia Rossiter

Apr 25, 2022

70 years of marriage: John and Phyllis Sizer pictured on Phyllis’s 90th birthday in 2020.

“We look after each other.”

Hold tight - we’re checking permissions before loading more content

That’s Phyllis Sizer’s answer when asked the secret to 70 years of marriage to husband John.

“And we’ve always advised our children and grandchildren to never to go sleep after a disagreement,” she said.

Phyllis and John — now aged 91 and 93 — met 75 years ago at a debutante ball.

“The first time I put her in my arms, I thought ‘I’m never going to let this one go’,” John said.

Wedding day: Phyllis and John Sizer of Shepparton, will celebrate their 70th anniversary on Tuesday, April 26. Photo by Bethanie Sessions

When they began courting, John remembered he used to ride a pushbike nearly 15km to visit Phyllis at her home, before he bought a Harley-Davidson bike with a sidecar.

Contrary to what some may assume, John said Phyllis’s father didn’t mind his daughter travelling to the pictures on the Harley.

“One night I asked her father to take her to the pictures and he agreed straight away,” he said.

When the couple was about to travel home for the night, it was pouring with rain, so John told Phyllis to lie down in the sidecar and zipped up the cover before taking her home.

“I thought Phyll would be petrified by the time we got home, but I unzipped the cover and she said ‘that was great fun’,” he said.

He said he was good friends with Stanley Vale, who married Phyllis’s twin sister, Jean, and they would travel together to visit the sisters.