Sixty years on and Owen Mander is still relieved that he chose to take his car, a Morris 8, to a dance at Ngaere. "I often cycled out to the dances, but that night I had my car, just as well, as I saw this young lady and thought she looked nice, so I asked if I could take her home."
That young lady was Doreen Gallagher and within a few months, she was also Owen's wife, with the couple marrying at Stratford's Immaculate Conception Catholic Church on October 15, 1955.
Doreen says she remembers the night she met Owen, "I was at the dance with some nursing friends of mine," she recalls, and she can even describe the dress she wore.
A pale grey crepe with a rose design on it, it really was such a pretty dress.
Doreen had moved to the area to work as a nurse at Avon Hospital in Stratford and says when Owen asked if her could see her again she agreed. "He seemed a nice man, and he still is!"