Looking back over the years it is surprising to find how many married couples swam for Adelaide Masters. In the 70s there were the Morris, Murphy, Gillett, Potter, Ross and Simons couples. Chris and Wendy Potter and Di and Rod Ross eventually left the group to form the Marion club.
Other couples in our club were/are Marj and Howard Muller, Jelle Lahnstein and Diana Fabiijan, Michael and Denise Standing, Jo and Stephen Sutcliffe, Dee and Greg Stevens, Stephanie and John Palmer-White, Helen Parsons and Andrew Martin, Sue and Graham Needham, Ruth and Ron Hartley, Peggy and Jim Muncaster and Roger and Joanne Baker. The first recorded marriage was when John Foote married Lorraine in 1981 and we all wished them well when they went to Fiji for their honeymoon.
I guess it is inevitable with so many fit young swimmers that there were many liaisons (some of which I can't mention), but one episode I do recall was when two young ladies (??!!) came to blows in a training session in the pool fighting over Dieter Loeliger!
Perhaps the couples who swim together stay together. Dieter married Sue White and David Engel married Helen Ryan but both those wives disappeared from the club and those marriages are now defunct.
Our most memorable occasion was the marriage of Lee and Mike O'Connell in 1985. We conducted a mock wedding ceremony in Rymill Park and all fifty of us dressed up as brides (some with a lot of facial hair), the groom wore football shorts, boots and top hat, and there were flower girls, mothers of the bride and the like. We formed a procession through the park led by Tony Marshall resplendent in a priest's cassock and a cowboy hat. He proceeded to read the 'service' on the island in the middle of the lake. The Japanese tourists recorded the not-so-typical Australian wedding with their cameras and one could only hope that they couldn't understand the sometimes lewd and suggestive comments and marital advice contained in Tony's sermon. We finished off the day with a picnic lunch and lots of champagne in the park.
Another wedding that stands out in memory was the mock send-up of a wedding party for Pat and Greg Tedder at the Manly Hotel after the Sydney Nationals in 1982. All the Adelaide Masters swimmers assumed the roles of uncles, aunts, cousins and assorted relatives and played their parts accordingly. There was a lot of raucous laughter and many blushes from the couple who were given a weird assortment of marital aids. It was a hilarious gathering and we deemed it a fitting send-off for the happy couple who were to be married in Newcastle. We assume Greg is still a park ranger somewhere in SA.
In more recent times Suzette met Noel Heritage in the club and they married and moved to Melbourne but still keep in touch. Julie Priest married Mark Farrelly, Paul Mutton wed Beate Jansen and Christopher Ford married Jo Woodcock.
One couple who endeared themselves to us was Rod Roberts and his partner Mal. Rod was the very popular choreographer of our floor shows and Mal was his very unassuming assistant. This possibly changed a lot of members' conceptions of gay couples. Sadly Mal passed away and Rod moved to Sydney.
This is a brief summary of the history of couples in our club as I observed it over the years. No doubt current members can add many more examples as well as give us some recent examples of marriages and liaisons that have taken place since.
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