Football's Manning Weds

By Stephen M. Silverman

09/11/1997 at 12:00 AM EDT

Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning and his longtime girlfriend, Ashley Thompson, whom he began dating during his first year at the University of Tennessee, were married in Memphis on Saturday. The groom's father, former New Orleans Saints quarterback Archie Manning, described the event as "a pretty big wedding, probably 600 people or so," reports the Associated Press. The couple kept their engagement a secret last summer, said the elder Manning, because "Peyton didn't want it to be a story during football season." He described his new daughter-in-law as "a great gal from a wonderful family here in Memphis."