SA couple's wedding vinyl returns home after 56 years and 10,000km trek

Australia Broadcast Center

5 days ago

When Dorothy Nicholls married Max Samuel on January 25, 1969, a church full of friends and family heard them exchange their vows.
But there was someone else listening in the congregation that Saturday evening — a sound recordist who captured their entire wedding service on a vinyl record.
Now, 56 years and 10,000 kilometres later, that record has come full circle and found its way back to the Samuel family in South Australia.
Max and Dorothy's daughter, Heidi Samuel, who lives in Tailem Bend, had no idea her late parents had recorded their wedding service until she saw a Facebook post.
The post came from a stranger, Barney Tompkins, who lives in Western Australia's south west.
Barney had found the vinyl recording of Max and Dorothy's nuptials in a Vinnies op shop while holidaying in Darwin.
Fascinated by his discovery, Barney took the record back to WA, and started his quest to locate the family of the couple whose vows were etched in vinyl.
Thanks to the power of social media, Barney was able to return the record to its rightful owner.
A friend shared his original post in Adelaide, then a friend of theirs shared it, and so on, until it was eventually shared on a local residents' page and reached Heidi.
When she saw the names of the married couple Barney was searching for — Dorothy K. Nicholls and Max S. Samuel — Heidi contacted him and claimed the record on behalf of her late parents.
Barney, who has a self-described passion for vinyl records, including curiosities like the Samuels' wedding recording, admitted to Heidi that he hadn't listened to it.
"I don't know whether it's just me, but it didn't seem quite right."
However, when Heidi gave him her blessing to play the record, he gave it a spin.
"It was just really, really lovely to hear the emotion in their voices, the nerves in their voices," Barney said.
Getting the vinyl to South Australia presented some challenges, however.
"Sending records during the Australian summer is always a bit risky … but this one being so special, I would have hated for something to happen to it in transit," Barney said.
Once the weather cooled down, Barney finally sent the record east.
Heidi said hearing her parents saying their marriage vows was deeply emotional.
"Sometimes you see your parents as a different sort of person, not actually as a young human, you know, with nerves and excitement and all that.
Heidi said she planned to play the recording for her extended family.
"We'll be sharing it with my aunties. Both my mum's and dad's sisters are still alive, so we'll be sharing it with them," she said.
The recording of wedding ceremonies onto vinyl records was most popular during the 1960s and 1970s, before the rise of video cameras.
But they were not commonplace, so Barney was thrilled when he found the Samuels' vinyl.
However, there remains a mystery about how and why the record ended up in Darwin.
What is known is that the recording was made at the Strathalbyn Lutheran Church, about 55km south-east of Adelaide, where the Samuels were married at 6pm on Saturday, January 25, 1969.
What happened to the record after that, and over the following 56 years, remains a mystery to Heidi.
"But it's lovely it was Barney who found it."