WHEN Barbara Wall saw Geoffrey Geddes standing on a railway platform, she turned to a friend and said: "If I could get to know that man, I would marry him."

The friend decided to introduce them - and today the couple, former owners of York printing and stationery firm Maxiprint, were celebrating their golden wedding.

They were planning a get-together in a marquee at their home in The Horsehoe, Dringhouses, York, with their daughters, Jill, Carrie and Rachel, their son, Alistair, and seven grandchildren, Sarah, Sophie, Toby, Joanne, Peter, Alexander and Luke.

But Barbara revealed the pair might never have married had she not decided to take a gamble.

"After meeting up, we used to chat on the train together on the way into London and got on like a house on fire," she said.

"But I was due to go to Rhodesia, as it was then known, to work for the Crown Agents for the Colonies. I told them I couldn't go because I was getting married."

It was a gamble, because at that stage, Geoffrey hadn't even asked her out. But on the day when she had been due to set sail, he finally did so, and they married in 1954 in Bromley, Kent

They moved to York in 1970, and Geoffrey became joint managing director of the former Ben Johnson printers. But in 1972, the couple bought Maxiprint, which then employed only two people.

The business expanded rapidly over the years, with 38 on the payroll by the time they sold it to PDQ last year.

Updated: 09:25 Saturday, August 28, 2004