FOR 65 years of their 67-year marriage, Tom and Barbara Trimnell have given their all in Hamilton.

The only reason they met is because teenage Tom was sent to the country after running away from Melbourne.

“If I talked to Dad, Mum actually said, ‘Don’t talk to him, he’ll think you like him’. It wasn’t good. They wouldn’t talk, and it affected me that I couldn’t chat.”

Sick of it all, instead of going to work one day he walked down to Spencer Street Station and bought a one-way ticket to Sydney, and then a one-way ticket to Brisbane.

He spent eight days in a Salvation Army hostel until plainclothes policemen strongly encouraged him to ring mum and head home.

It wasn’t long after then he was sent up to Jeparit where his mum hoped some farmer would pick him up and sort him out.

It didn’t take long - he started work on the Monday and was driving tractors by Tuesday.

“I am only about 16, I’m standing on the backplate, Alec was driving the tractor around the paddock. He stopped, then he got off and stood on the back and I sat on the seat and now I am driving the tractor.

“I went around once, he said, ‘you’re going alright, I’ll go and do something else’, so he went off to the sheds.”

Mr Trimnell had found a place for himself and he stayed on for seven years. 

“It sorted me out, I had purpose, I had a loving family,” he said.

And before long: “I’d started to become friendly with the girl on the farm next door.”

He and Barbara could not get married on 7 pound a week between the two of them, so he sensibly went to get a government job in the city. Then came an opportunity to run a goat farm on the Bellarine.

Mrs Trimnell had a favourite Methodist minister who married the two of them in Melbourne and afterward, Mr Trimnell wrote to enquire about the fee.

Reverend Stanley Wilcock wrote back, “I thought it was understood that it was on the house! Since he wants to pay something, I think one small bottle of goat’s milk would about fit the bill.

“It’s not often I can write to newly-weds and tell them that I hope all the ‘kids’ are well.”

They moved around for post office work, four weeks at a time, first to Edenhope and then to Naracoorte.

“And then we came down to Hamilton to work for four weeks and nobody’s told us to leave, we’re still here,” Mr Trimnell said.

They raised seven children in Hamilton, two of whom are disabled and own their homes here.

“We have 12 grandchildren, 21 great-grandchildren, and our granddaughter says she is a grandmother because she moved in with a fellow with a child and so she’s accepted them as hers,” Mrs Trimnell said.

“So, if she’s a grandmother, we are great-great-grandparents. I have seven printed A4 pages with all their birthdays and anniversaries and who they married and their addresses otherwise I wouldn’t know.”

Their son and daughter-in-law have nine foster children too, which adds plenty more to the clan.

The joy of a large family does not come without tragedy though.

The Trimnells lost a granddaughter in 2012 to a car accident in Bendigo, an event which Mrs Trimnell described as “the worst day of our lives”. Alicia was 19 and is remembered every day.

Many long-term residents would remember Mr Trimnell manning the gates at the Hamilton Drive-in Theatre.

Five particular residents may also remember him chasing them out from behind the cinema after they tried to jump the fence while standing on their bicycles.

“I had a boss that loved getting people to do things that were a bit weird – Kevin and Doreen were a lovely couple, he loved to dress me up,” he said.

Pictured with this article is Mr Trimnell in gear as Clark Kent to celebrate Superman 2 coming to the screen in 1982.

He ran for council in 1989 and was only a councillor for a couple of weeks before he was unexpectedly thrust into the spotlight.

The mayor had to miss the meeting and not a single other councillor was available to deputise. The new blood was told not to worry, the shire president would handle the response speech to the toast to local government.

“I didn’t realise the president wasn’t there!

“I stood up and of course I had only just got onto council, so I thought I’d give a resume about how I ended up there.”

That ended up with a huge round of applause and started him off for his tenure.

Mr and Mrs Trimnell were mayor and mayoress for a year and oversaw redevelopments at the Hamilton Performing Arts Centre.

Starting in 2004, he travelled seven times to Nepal to deliver funds raised for Leprosy Mission Australia.

All up they raised $80,000 together for health relief efforts.

“I had one particular family, a little bloke named Raj and his wife. They had about three or four children and I spent a lot of time with them on the trips.”

They got along so well that their kids would call him granddad. He had the privilege of bringing his daughter Elizabeth along on his final visit too.

They keep busy on their weekends.

“I reckon we would have to be the only couple who attend church two or three times a weekend,” Mr Trimnell chuckled.

“We go to church every Saturday night at the Anglican. Then on the Sunday we go to the Uniting, and the following Sunday we go to the Lutheran at Tarrington at 9 o’clock. Then we get in the car and go to Penshurst at the Uniting and we have church down there with them.

“Our weekends are just beautiful, we love it.”

Both Mr and Mrs Trimnell have both attended church since the days where they sang in children’s choir and were regular faithfuls at the Church of Christ in Hamilton until it closed.