THERE was to have been a big party when Dave and Lyn Totterdell celebrated their 50 years of marriage last month, but the golden event had to be put off, and they enjoyed a superb meal instead at the Beer Engine, Newton St Cyres with their immediate family.

Then they had a week in the Newquay area, blessed with lovely weather, walking the coastal footpaths.

Both from Exeter, they were married at Heavitree Parish Church on September 12, 1970. By then Lyn was working for Securicor as a radio controller for the vans which meant keeping a check on all the Securicor vehicles out on the road and Dave was an apprentice with SWEB. They had met at their local Youth Club.

Their first home together was in Cheriton Fitzpaine. Then a move to Meadowside at Sandford. By 1977 the house had become a bit small for them with their two children and the Brady Close homes were being built. The family moved in and Dave and Lyn have lived there very happily ever since.

Before they married Dave played football in Exeter. He was a founder of the Crescent football team. “We used to always kick a ball around as boys and so we formed the team,” said Dave.

He was goalkeeper and also played at Cheriton Fitzpaine and Sandford. In fact their second date was to watch Exeter City play in a cup match against Tottenham Hotspur. Both play skittles, curtailed at the moment because of Covid.

Whilst the children were small, Dave encouraged Lyn to do a cookery course at Exeter College during the evenings, she ended up attending for five years, so is qualified in decorating celebration and wedding cakes too.

Though the trend then was working with royal icing, now the more popular method is roll out sugar paste for icing etc. She enjoyed making their daughter’s wedding cake and with her help, made hundreds of sugar flowers to decorate the four tiers.

When the children were older Lyn worked for almost 10 years at the Bristol and West Building Society in Crediton until the branch closed.

Lyn had been a Brownie, and Girl Guide in Exeter, then like a lot of Mums, helped when her daughter joined at Sandford. Lyn became Brown Owl for five years after Kath Wilson moved away.

“We had a lot of fun but I left because I had taken on more hours with the business,” said Lyn, although she remains a member of the Trefoil Association and attends regular meetings when things are normal.

After leaving school, Dave was apprenticed to the SWEB depot and showroom at Crediton (where Town and Country was until recently), until 1982 when SWEB was relocated to Sowton. Dave worked up through the SWEB ranks, gradually working more from home.

“I ended up being a trouble shooter for SWEB dealing with the intricate faults on commercial machines, washing machines, etc.

“Then, SWEB announced that it was making more than 150 electricians redundant and was to be taken over by a new company.

“I thought I might as well work for myself so, in January 1994 bought myself a little van, put adverts in the Courier and elsewhere, and here we are,” he said.

Their son Paul is now a co-director. He had trained as a mechanic and then an electrician. He is also in great demand as a domestic appliance engineer.

Dave said: “We have enjoyed and loved what we have done, we’ve seen so many changes in the business, just think how washing machines have changed for instance. To do the laundry used to take all day with an old boiler and mangle, now an automatic washing machine does the wash very quickly.

“I think the biggest change though is in personal contact. We try to keep that, people do prefer talking to a person, you cannot explain to a machine in the same way.”

Their daughter Alison is a great help also, as she works for a local accountant and is always on the end of a ‘phone to try to solve any queries that they may have.

Dave and Lyn have two children - Alison and Paul who both live locally. They have four grandchildren.

Paul and his partner had to rearrange their wedding plans due to Covid, so the family look forward to more celebrations next year!