Fliss, from Ashton-under-Lyne, was moved to tears on The Repair Shop after expert Richard Talman restored a broken locket that had belonged to her grandparents, Bert and Winifred. The gold locket, which contained a picture of Bert in uniform, had been in the family for over a century and was carried by Winifred throughout World War II.
The locket had split in half and was covered in teeth marks made by Fliss's uncle when he was a baby. Fliss hoped the piece could be repaired so she could add a photo of her grandmother, reuniting the couple's images.
Family Heirloom
Fliss told Richard: "It's at least 107 years it's been in the family, at least. It's got a picture of my grandad from when he was in Second World War. He signed up the day after war broke out. So my grandma wore it whilst he was away at war."
She also had a "battered" photo of her grandmother that her grandfather had carried through the war. "They were very much in love," she said. "And you can tell that by the letters from when he was at war and how much they absolutely adored each other... it is the only piece of jewellery that I have from my grandma. I love the fact that she wore it."
Emotional Reveal
Fliss, who lost her granddad in 2005 and her grandma in 2014, wanted the locket repaired and the teeth marks removed. She also wanted to add a picture of her grandmother inside, saying: "So they're kind of next to each other again."
Richard made a new hinge and removed the dents. When Fliss returned to the barn and saw the finished locket, she clasped her hands to her face and tearfully exclaimed: "That's amazing!"
She added: "It's perfect that it's the pictures that they each held. It's got a lot of meaning behind it so yeah, that is incredible. Thank you so much. They've never been in the locket together. It's an amazing feeling."
Fliss said she planned to wear the locket every day, insisting: "It will not come off at all." She reflected: "I didn't get many years with either of my grandparents so to be able to have them with me and to tell their story and what I remember of them, it's more than I could have ever hoped for."
The Repair Shop airs on BBC One.
