YORK, Pa. -- It's not every day that you come across a couple that’s been together for almost three quarters of a century.
However, for one pair in York County, they hit that milestone on Saturday, celebrating 73 years of marriage.
95-year-old Bernie Vottero and 93-year-old Loretta Vottero say they remember the day they first met, when a friend introduced them.
“He said Bernie that girl that was down with my girlfriend she’d like to meet you," said Bernie Vottero.
From that day on, the two were inseparable.
“I didn’t like anybody else and I got in my mind that I love him," said Loretta Vottero.
Bernie says he had no car but would walk more than two miles just to see Loretta.
One night while walking back home, he says a friend driving by asked what he was doing.
"I just came from my girlfriends house and he goes you must love that girl or something to be bumming a ride at two o’clock in the morning," said Bernie Vottero.
In 1943 Bernie was drafted by the Navy in World War II.
"I said hey, when I come back I am going to marry her," said Vottero.
Vottero says they kept in touch by writing letters each week.
“I still remember after seventy three years the song she wrote me in a letter," said Bernie Vottero. "This love of mine was the name of the song, she wrote it, this love of mine goes on and on though nothing matters since you have gone," he added.
Three years later when he returned from overseas, the two got married in 1946.
They later had four children, who are all fully grown today with their own kids.
Even though the years have brought some changes and both now live in a nursing home, their love for each other has not changed.
“Remember when I told you a few months ago if I had to do it all over again and would marry you?" said Bernie Vottero.