Looking at the old, grainy black and white photographs collected on a table, a friend exclaims “Ya’ll look like movie stars!”

Despite the 50 years that have passed since the photos have been taken, Edwin and Joyce Swindle still make a handsome couple.

Dignified and upright, the silhouette the lovers cut is still the same, even though they both turned 70 last year.

The Swindles came together with family and friends at the Barrett Road Methodist Church Saturday to celebrate a love story 50 years old.

The couple married when they were both 20, on Feb. 12, 1955.

While the years have marched on steadily since, the idea that 50 years have passed since getting married is something of a surprise to them.

“If you’d asked me if it’d been 50 years I’d say ‘no,'” Joyce said. After a moment of reflection, she amended her statement, “maybe 20.”

According to Edwin, the couple met while working at Independent Lock.

They’d both been working at the plant for several years before actually meeting.

“I was just tired of dating,” Edwin said. “I met Joyce. I fell in love.”

They got married after a courtship.

It didn’t seem to be a big deal at the time.

They had a quick wedding on a Saturday. Then they returned to work on Monday.

Edwin never thought about the wedding day’s closeness to Valentine’s Day.

“It never dawned on me (that) two days (later) was Valentine’s Day,” he said.

After getting married, the rest was easy, the couple said.

They changed jobs a few times, Edwin working at local dairy company and Joyce working at Southside High School.

They raised three children, two girls and a boy and went to church every Sunday.

Edwin said they stayed together for 50 years “peacefully.”

“We get along,” he said. “We have spats, but nothing serious.”

Neither of them feel that the marriage was hard to keep together. They just kept going to church and let God take care of things.

“The good Lord been good to us,” Edwin said. “We’ve been blessed.”

The blessings seem to be genetic.

Edwins children are all in long marriages. The oldest, Dean Swindle, has been married for 25 years.

The 44-year-old husband has enjoyed his marriage to his wife Ann.

All of the Swindle’s children display the easy-going camaraderie of the senior couple.

Hopefully, Dean’s wife Ann said, the grandchildren of the Swindle will find happiness as well.

“I just hope my kids can find somebody they love that long,” she said.

Stephanie Swindle, a communications major at Auburn University, said she’s inspired by her grandparents devotion.

“I know that whenever I get married it’s going to be one person and an eternal thing,” she said.

For Stephanie and all the world’s young couples, the Swindles have some advice. Stay in church, work hard and give to each other.

“Do a lot of giving,” Joyce said.