You remember the old rhyme, “First comes love, then comes marriage, then come....” all the kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids in their baby carriages. Let’s roll the calendar back to the marriage part.
When classmates Scott Johnson and Sandy Jones Johnson posted on August 16 that they had gone to the iconic Earle restaurant in downtown Ann Arbor to celebrate their 55th wedding anniversary, it got us wondering how many other class members had reached that milestone—or even bigger ones. We posed the question in the class Facebook group.
Martha Paul Sauer pointed out that while 55 years is a lot, it wouldn’t be too unusual since many of us graduated from college at around that time. Some of the class members we heard from were Larry Birchfield and his wife, Susan; Betty Bostic Parks and husband; Bobbie Goddard Lam and Blaine; and classmates Monty Okey and JoAnn King Okey. George Henry and his wife, Barbara, were married the day after he was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force at 21. Bob Hinderer and his wife, Dianna, celebrated 55 years at the start of 2025.
Then the years started really piling up:
56: Classmates Pete and Barb Kendall Souza
56: Lew and Colleen McLean Calver
57: Hilbert and Vicki Lewis Bernal
58: Bill Brooks and Alice
58: Bob and Jan Shively Pratt
60: Jim and Cheryl Meyer Sartori
Duane Brown jumped in to say that, having gotten married at age 70, he won’t hit 55 years with Pasha until he’s 125 years old. Lynn Umpleby Fuentes can relate to that, although she and her husband, Jose, only have to live to 120 to do the same. Like Nancy McArtor, (married at 72), they appreciate how fortunate these other class members are to have had so much time with the person they love.
