Gerry Turner is ready to take on the role of the first Golden Bachelor.
Because as the retired restaurateur from Indiana put it in a new sneak peek for the show, “It’s never too late to fall in love again.” And in the teaser for The Golden Bachelor, Gerry—who proudly notes he’s “71 years young”—shared the story of his first love with late wife Toni.
“I married my high school sweetheart Toni in 1972,” he told viewers in a clip that aired during the Aug. 14 episode of The Bachelorette: The Men Tell All. “We had 43 wonderful years together. We had two daughters, and I now have two wonderful granddaughters. We had a real typical but beautiful life—full of love, full of activity.”
After Gerry and Toni retired, they purchased what he called their “dream house” in May 2017. However, things changed for them the following month.
“From June 6 on, it didn’t go according to plan at all,” he recalled before tearing up. “She became ill, and her situation got worse over a couple of weeks. And so, we went to the emergency room, and she had a bacterial infection that infected her kidneys and infected her liver. And so, I took my wife to the emergency room on July 7. She passed away on July 15.”