Married 60 Years -- Les & Aleen Hicks

Leslie Hicks and Aleen Smith were married on June 7, 1950. 
The wedding was performed and celebrated at the Port Maitland Reformed Baptist Church in Port Maitland, Nova Scotia, the bride's home church.
The groom was a farmer's son and the bride a fisherman's daughter.
Aleen was slim and pretty in a white floor-length gown and simple veil.
She carried a bouquet of red roses. 
Leslie wore a dark double-breasted suit and a white boutonniere.
Leslie's brother Floyd and Aleen's sister Hazel were both in the wedding party as well.
The young couple's happiness was captured in a black and white photo taken at the bride's home.
They loved one another then, and, after sixty years, their love and devotion for one another is still apparent to all who know them.


Les was a young preacher, and they moved to Centerville, New Brunswick, where he pastored two country churches on a circuit. He was a good preacher, and got better as time went on. Aleen had a strong soprano voice and played the piano. She sang songs like "Little Is Much When God is in It" and "Until Then". They were a strong ministry team. Later they pastored in Fort Fairfield, Maine, then in Fredericton, New Brunswick. By 1963, they had three children, Gary, Donald and Nancy. 


In 1966 they moved to Shelburne, Nova Scotia, to again pastor a circuit of two country churches, 28 miles apart. The churches provided a rented home in which to live and $40 a week. Leslie painted houses and sold mutual funds on the side to make ends meet. He was a good carpenter, and in 1968 built a large new parsonage for the circuit. He has a gift for thriftiness, and has always paid cash for his new cars.


As the children grew, Aleen nurtured them in her quiet way, a devoted mother and friend to them at every stage. All these years she has modeled the love of Jesus with grace and simplicity.


In 1972, Les and Aleen moved to Havelock, New Brunswick, the village near Hicks Settlement  where Les had been born. Again they pastored two rural churches on a circuit, but within two years Les brought the two congregations together in Havelock, where he was the lead carpenter in the construction of a new church building, then a new parsonage as well. After 17 years of pastoral ministry in Havelock, Les and Aleen retired in 1989, moving down the road to a new house he had just completed and where they still live.


But Leslie loves to preach, and served as a short-term supply pastor in Crapaud, Prince Edward Island and then in Elgin, New Brunswick. Eventually he became the regular "pulpit supply" at Kinnear Settlement United Baptist Church, where he has now served for about 12 years. 


A lot has changed over 60 years of married life. Steps are sometimes halting, and thoughts and words come a bit more slowly. But their love and devotion to one another grows steadily. This marriage is still a living, breathing, joyful thing. Now Leslie and Aleen have grandchildren and great-grands. Theirs is the legacy of two lives well-lived, well joined together, two lives of faithfulness and steady service. The world is a richer, better place because of this couple, this wedded team of common saints.


On your 60th wedding anniversary, thank you, Mom and Dad!