Maurice and Helen Kaye of Bournemouth celebrated their 80^th wedding anniversary on Wednesday.

The couple met when Helen was 16 and Maurice was 17 years old, and they are now 101 and 102 years old, respectively.

Maurice went into Helen's mother's store in Walworth, South London in 1929 to see if his father's goods could be sold in the shop, the BBC reports. He was there for three hours, leading his future mother-in-law to ask Helen, "Who's going to throw him out, you or me?"

Helen was intrigued by Maurice after she found out he owned a car.

"In those days not very many people had cars, which made him interesting," she told BBC News.

The couple courted for four years because they had to wait for Helen's older sister to marry. They wed in 1934 in Borough Synagogue in south London, and had four children.

Speaking to the BBC, the couple shared that a happy marriage is built on tolerance and compromise.

"You mustn't be hard on each other," Helen explained. "And if you have to give in a little bit, you give in a little bit."

She also said that it is fate, not luck, that has kept them together.

"You can never plan anything," she insisted. "How can you plan for 80 years? It is fate."

Maurice said that agreeing with his wife is the secret to their long marriage.

"I didn't think it would last a week but it's amazing it's lasted 80 years," he stated.

The Kayes have two surviving children, seven grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. Their 66-year-old son, Larry, said that setting goals contributes to his parents' longevity.

"They wanted to see their grandchildren, then their great-grandchildren and now they want to see their great-grandchildren grow up," he told BBC.

The UK's oldest couple is Karam and Kartari Chand of Bradford who married in 1925.