4:11pm Friday 13th July 2012
By Haydn Lewis
SEVEN couples set aside superstition and chose to get married in York on Friday the Thirteenth.
Traditionally, if the thirteenth of the month falls on a Friday, York’s register office falls silent, according to Robert Livesey, the city’s superintendent registrar. But yesterday was as busy for him and his team as any other day on the calendar.
Couples seemed to pay no heed to old wives’ superstition, with four weddings at the Bootham office and three at city hotels.
Mr Livesey said: “Normally we might get one couple braving it on Friday the Thirteenth, but usually not even that. To get seven is unprecedented. We have never got that many before and I think that’s just down to the fact that it’s still regarded by some people as being unlucky.
“About half our weddings in York are couples who don’t live in the city and so that might have something to do with it as one couple are coming from France and the date held no superstitious meaning for them. For other people it might be an anniversary or hold a special significance of some kind.”
The date failed to put off Midori Frame, 26, a trainee accountant, and Ash Wilkinson, 29, a sound engineer, both from Kingsway North.
They tied the knot at The Pavilion Hotel in Fulford with about 100 family and friends joining them.
Midori said: “I wouldn’t say I’m that superstitious. I say hello to magpies, but that’s about it. For us the date was more about timing so that I had enough time to sit my accountancy exams and so that we could go on honeymoon. We don’t really mind about Friday the Thirteenth and I have been told that it’s actually lucky to marry on that date.”
The couple, who met at the University of York and have been together for five years, plan to honeymoon in Tobago.
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