“My half-brothers said it’ll never last,” Walt Carlson told me. “We were too young.”

Despite those predictions 74 years ago, Walt and Helen Carlson are tucked next to each other on a loveseat, as close as two peas in a pod. The occasion is their 74th wedding anniversary.

Although recovering from a recent heart attack, Walt’s memory and voice are strong when he recalls the moment he first saw Helen while walking with a friend in Vancouver, Wash., in 1935.

“Who’s that girl?” he asked.

“That’s my sister,” his friend replied.

“Well I want to meet her,” Walt told him.

They were married 14 months later on Feb. 11, 1936. The weather on their wedding day was terrible – what’s called a silver thaw when rain freezes as it hits frozen ground and tree limbs, one step below an ice storm.

They each had two attendants, and there was a reception afterward; Helen’s mother had prepared all of the food.

Helen was 18 and Walt was just shy of 20.

After a few months, they decided to move north to Seattle to look for work. Helen worked for a family for $10 a week. Walt got a job at N & S Foundry, which used to be located south of the Ballard Bridge on Elliott Avenue, near the railroad tracks.

As part of his work, he had to load iron into a wheelbarrow and transport it into the foundry to melt: a 1,000 pounds of iron in the wheelbarrow, up to seven times a day.

He worked there five years but the damage to his back has lasted 70.

Walt and Helen had one daughter, Marilynn Rae Prinzing – “our pride and joy.” Unfortunately, she died six years ago.

However, she had four daughters, and the Carlsons now have the four granddaughters and five great-grandchildren (including, strangely enough, two boys), the oldest of which just married in August.

In 1946, when Marilynn was 9 years old, they bought land in Ballard and built a five-room house with basement on Northwest 74th Street, between 30th Avenue Northwest and 32nd Avenue Northwest.

Walt and Helen Carlson have lived there ever since.

Walt retired from a banking office 34 years ago, and Helen retired from Seattle City Light 32 years ago. For five years she worked at the customer service office that was on Market Street.

The Carlsons have been members of the Philadelphia Church on 24th Avenue Northwest ever since they moved into the neighborhood 64 years ago. Walt was a song leader and choir director and sang in their quartet for almost 20 years.

Until recently, the Carlsons enjoyed relatively good health. Then Helen broke her arm in a fall, and Walt had a heart attack and has not yet been able to return home, an unusual separation since their wedding day during the silver thaw in 1936.

Helen is 91. Walt will be 94 in March.

In the lists of traditional wedding anniversary gifts, there isn’t a specific recommendation for the 74th. The list jumps abruptly from the 70th to the 75th, skipping by fives up to 100.

But, every year the recommendation after the 70th anniversary is the same – diamonds, diamonds, diamonds.

Helen’s right arm is still mending, and she keeps it tucked between her and Walt.

She can cite every great-grandchild, every important date in all of their lives together and reminds Walt when he repeats what he has already said, but it’s clear that the he feels it bears repeating.

“I can honestly say that since I met Helen I was never out with another girl,” Walt said, and with that he turned to his bride and they smiled at each other.

His half-brothers were so wrong when they said the marriage wouldn’t last; it has lasted longer than the average lifetime.