On Oct. 6, when John Primi, 92, married Norma Ortiz, both ABC and NBC television were there for the simple, civil ceremony, performed by Village Clerk John Dominsky, at the Village Hall on Baker Hill Road.

It was an unusual day, but not for John Primi.

He has dined in palaces, and eaten the bark off trees to stave off hunger; he worked in the Philippines to help that country's people understand democracy; he was the man that could be seen cranking the camera at the beginning of Paramount newsreels; he made documentaries and edited them by hand; he has worked as a bellboy, a typist, a secretary; he speaks 10 languages and, at 92, his razor sharp memory can vividly recall the many people he has met, interviewed and photographed. The list includes¬George Bernard Shaw, Pope Paul, Jawaharlal Nehru, Toscanini, Mike Todd, Mussolini, Charlie Chaplin, Gary Cooper, and Elizabeth Taylor.

The most memorable for ''sheer brain power'' was Shaw, he said. ''I was editing a film for Paramount in London when Shaw arrived. ...There was a fire in London and all our stock film burned...That was in 1931...'' To get more film would take about an hour and Mr. Primi was chosen to keep Mr. Shaw company. They told him, ''John you can talk...tell Shaw all about our production and take your time...stretch it...''

''Shaw noticed that I was taking notes in Pitman shorthand,'' Primi said. '' ' I say, you are a Pitmanite,' Shaw said. 'Yes,' I said, 'and I have won many prizes.' 'I am also a Pitmanite...' Shaw said. 'It's the only way you can solve the English language problem.' Which is true. Here's the point: we have only 26 letters in the English language but we have 92 different sounds and therein lies the problem. Shaw loved shorthand.

''Then Shaw said to me, 'Let's have a game...Let's see who can find the simplest symbol for all around the world...' Shaw started writing ... 'Why aren't you writing?' he asked me. 'I have it in my mind,' I said. He thought of something else, and jotted it down...I said, 'Mine is simpler.' He had several tries, and I kept saying, 'Mine is simpler.' 'This I have to see,' Shaw said. I took my pencil and made a single dot with a circle around the dot ...''

Mr. Primi pointed out that George Bernard Shaw was very much in favor of a universal language¬Esperanto, a language Mr. Primi had learned in public school in Austria.

''Nehru, now that's another beautiful story,'' Mr. Primi said. And he went on to tell how he just happened to be in India: In 1948, Sister Anna Dengel, who is a physician, had asked him to do a film about the Catholic Medical Mission Sisters, a society Dr. Dengel had founded back in 1925 to relieve the suffering of women in India. Being in India, for John Primi, meant that he had to meet Jawaharlal Nehru, who was then prime minister.

''I went to a tailor in India,'' Mr. Primi said. ''And I asked him to make me an outfit exactly like Nehru's, pants, shirt, everything...By Easter Sunday, it was all done...When I approached the gates where Nehru was speaking, I saw it guarded by security...sheiks with guns...They saw me coming dressed exactly like Nehru, carrying my camera and they hesitated for a moment, and then called out: 'Make way for the international news service' and they let me pass. Nehru, who was in the midst of a speech to millions of people, saw me coming dressed in exactly the same clothes as he had on, and, for a moment, he lost his speech...''

Afterwards, as Nehru was leaving, he saw John Primi in the crowd, stopped the car, lowered the window and said, ''You intrigue me...What are you doing this evening?'' It was an evening John Primi will always remember: Nehru was a brilliant man and one of his favorites.

In 1951, John Primi was back in London, working for Cinerama and traveling with Mike Todd. Todd, he said, was a ''slippery guy.'' But through Todd, he met one of the most memorable and beautiful women in the world¬Elizabeth Taylor. ''Liz was very clean...morally I mean...,'' he said.

At the age of three, John Primi, who was born in the United States, accompanied his mother to her native home on the Island of Lussino in the northeast Adriatic Sea. ''My mother was in poor health and the doctor advised her that a trip back to her home might help...I was one of 13 children. All but three of us died. When the first World War began, we were stranded and couldn't get out.''

Times were hard. Mr. Primi recalls seeing people drop in the streets from lack of food. After World War I, the portion of Austria where they lived passed to Italy. Primi became a student at the Naval Academy, and was forced to take the fascist oath to stay in school. At the age of 17, he escaped from Italian surveillance and made his way to New York to reclaim his American citizenship. His experience was the basis of his film, World in Flames, an anti-war documentary assembled from more than 10,000,000 feet of newsreel footage.

Mr. Primi said he had written to President Clinton, telling him how all presidents have had their problems and not to lose heart. ''I told him I thought the present investigation was a witch hunt and I hoped his presidency would survive,'' Mr. Primi said. ''I also told him that all the presidents have had their problems and how I had met Franklin Roosevelt, whose problems were surely some of the most difficult. 'You are a man of this era, and your problems are of this era...' I wrote.''

John Primi's distinguished and long career has taken him all over the world, but he has always returned to his home in Great Neck, the town he moved to 54 years ago and where he raised his three sons.

He says the secret to a long, happy life is simple: ''Number one, have the right genes from your parents; two, eat only fresh food, not out of a can...make sure it's well cooked; work hard, sleep well, sleep happy and never lie...''

In the hour and a half this reporter spent at Mr. Primi's Baker Hill home, his new bride was watching him with adoring eyes. If love can keep a person well, John Primi will be hale and hearty at 120.