Weekend of fun to mark 50 happy years together

Published on Monday 25 July 2011 11:44

Patricia and Wallace Scobie are preparing to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary this weekend in the company of many of their friends and family.

The couple from Buckstone will celebrate their golden wedding anniversary today with dinner at the Grosvenor Hotel in Edinburgh, the same venue where they held their wedding reception.

This will be followed by a weekend with more than 60 friends and family, including an evening meal at the Tusitala restaurant, and lunches at the Ratho Park Carvery and Mortonhall Golf Club, where Mr Scobie is a member.

Mr Scobie, 77, first met Mrs Scobie, 71, in 1958 when she was working as a clerkesss for the Clydesdale Bank and he was in his final year studying dentistry at Glasgow University.

"I went to Arran on holiday with my friend and it was there that we both met the girls we were to marry," he said.

Mr Scobie qualified in 1959 and in 1960, almost two years after meeting his future wife, he was called up for National Service in the Royal Army Dental Corps.

The couple married at St Stephen's Church in Edinburgh in 1961 before moving to the married quarters at Aldershot army barracks where Mr Scobie was stationed.

They returned to Edinburgh in 1962 after Mr Scobie was discharged from the army.

He continued to practise dentistry and went on to buy his own dental practice on Rankeillor Street in 1964, the same year the couple started their family.

Mr and Mrs Scobie had three sons and one daughter. At the ages of 15 and 22, two of the Scobie's sons were registered blind after being affected by the hereditary condition Leber's, which causes loss of vision.

Their third son is currently receiving treatment to prevent the condition developing and Mrs Scobie and her daughter are both carriers of the gene.

Mrs Scobie also lost her sight in 1988, at the age of 48, and in 1991, after 29 years of practising dentistry in Edinburgh, Mr Scobie applied for early retirement in order to care for his wife.

Mrs Scobie said: "He had to take on all the domestic chores, I even taught him to cook."

The couple are now enjoying life and love holidaying abroad and spending time with their grandchildren.

Mrs Scobie said: "Our children are all in Edinburgh and we also have three grandchildren so that keeps us busy."

She also explained that the key to a long and successful marriage is to accept that couples will argue and to make an effort to solve problems.

"I don't believe people who say they haven't had an argument in 50 years," she said. "Everyone argues. Always make up, never go to bed on an argument."