EARLIER this month, the Shepparton community lost one half of one of its most enduring couples – the Slees.
Former Shepparton Mayor, Murray Slee, was married to his beloved wife, Myra Jean Slee, for an incredible 71 years before her peaceful passing at Maculata Place this month at the age of 93.
Myra, mother of Robyn, Dianne, Jenny and Helen, grandmother of four and great grandmother of five, lived her whole life in Shepparton after she was born here in the winter of 1927.
Her husband, Murray, who sat as a councillor for 34 years, survives her and turns 98 next April.
Speaking at his home on Corio Street with a coffee in hand, Murray described his late wife with love glistening in his voice.
“She was always an understanding character,” he said with a smile.
“When I met her, she was working as a clerk at a solicitor’s firm as a teenager. That was 1947. I remember she was always dressed well.”
Murray, a talented footballer in those days, remembers clearly Saturday nights catching films at the Star Theatre, sneaking into local dances afterwards then grabbing a late dinner at a milk bar.
The pair married in October, 1949 – after the footy season – at Scots Church in Shepparton. A photograph from that day shows a crowd around the couple, clamouring close outside the church, and Murray assured me there were many more still inside.
Myra’s father, a butcher, was also president of the Shepparton Football Club where Murray was a star. It’s a connection that makes Murray chuckle even now, probably at the memory of tongue-in-cheek changeroom comments he would have had to fend off from courting the president’s daughter.
Murray easily lists off all of Myra’s skills and talents that would make anyone remarkable: She had beautiful hand-writing, she rode horses, played golf, cards, could dance the Highland Fling and did the splits at her 60th birthday.
She was a wonderful Mayoress, Murray said. The pair was intertwined into the Shepparton community for decades. The inner circle of friends Murray and Myra were a part of, Murray nicknamed ‘the gang.’
“I never heard Myra say a bad word about anyone,” Murray said.
“She was always tolerant, very sympathetic, she always thought the best of people.
“And if she decided she’d do something, she’d do it very well and dedicate herself to it.”
