They met during WWII, they've been together ever since

More than seven decades ago, Army Air Corps pilot Ben Ryan walked into the officers’ club in Panama set up on a blind date with a girl named Agnes — though everyone called her Butchie.

Butchie was an Army nurse. Her ship was headed through the Panama Canal when it broke down.

Ben said it wasn’t love at first sight. There were other girls in the club that night.

“Butchie wasn’t the prettiest,” Ben recalled last week. “But she had the best personality. She grows on you. There’s only one Butchie.”

A few months later, the two were married. They’ve been together ever since. Last Wednesday the couple celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary at the Montana Veterans Home. Ben is 93, Butchie 94.

Ben grew up in Three Forks and Livingston. He studied at Stanford University for two years before World War II, then enlisted in the Army, where they taught him to be a fighter pilot. He was in the reserves and saw active duty in 1944, where he flew P-39s and P-38s protecting the Panama Canal.

Butchie grew up in Hazleton, Pennsylvania and enlisted as an army nurse during the war. Her family members were also in the army medical field.

The nursing degree came in handy after the war. Butchie helped pay expenses when Ben went back to Stanford and got his degree in petroleum engineering. He worked in the oil industry across the country and abroad, including California, Wyoming, Venezuela, and Alaska. He recommended searching for oil in Prudhoe Bay, which turned out to be one of the largest oil fields in North America.

After leaving the oil business, the couple lived in West Glacier for 45 years, where they had an air strip and a tree farm.

Their secret to long a marriage is simple.

“Pick the right girl,” Ben said.

“Ditto,” Butchie said. “Pick the right man.”