A couple who are celebrating their Golden wedding anniversary still have the ticket from the night they met at a dance.

Ray and Margaret Howe, nee Southgate, met on December 4 1954 at a dance evening at the Super Baths Swimming Pool at the Bakers Arms in Leyton - which is now a supermarket.

On June 20 they will celebrate their 50th anniversary and despite all the year’s that have passed, Mr Howe has kept the ticket as a momentum of their first meeting - priced at three shillings and sixpence.

Mr Howe said: “On the evening of the dance I happened to notice two pretty young ladies standing on their own and I walked over and asked if I could have a dance with the first young lady.

“Margaret agreed to the dance and of course I tried as the evening progressed for more dances, with success. I eventually asked if I could see her home and met her the next day, and the rest is history.”

But it could all have been different for the young sweethearts as joker Ray didn't tell his future wife that he was on National Service, instead saying he was unemployed.

Mrs Howe herself was a machinist at Peter French in St Andrew’s Road, Walthamstow, and was concerned that he was not working because very few people were unemployed at that time.

But after initially playing along Mr Howe soon owned up to being a serviceman back on weekend leave from a posting in the Middle East. Mrs Howe revealed later in their marriage that she thought she had landed herself a “devious character”.

The couple sealed their engagement during the interval of a performance at the London Palladium in 1958.

They tied the knot the following year on June 20 - also Mr Howe’s birthday - at The Church of St Peter and St Paul’s in Chingford, and moved to Lyndhurst Drive in Leyton to start their married life.

Following serving in the forces, Mr Howe returned to his job in a wholesale newsagents in Stratford. In 1967 he bought a newspaper stand in Grove Green Road in Leytonstone, from which they served the community for 21 years along with their sons Peter and Colin.

They also bought a freehold on the Corner General Store in James Lane and Essex Road, Leyton where they worked for many years before a heart attack forced Mr Howe to retire from the business and they moved to Suffolk.

Mr and Mrs Howe will celebrate their anniversary with their sons and their families at a restaurant in Buckhurst Hill.