Wedding Picture August 18, 1956
Taken in Abilene, Texas, August 18, 1956. I cannot imagine being that okay with standing in the West Texas August heat, but I must not have noticed that day. This is out of sequence, but when I write that book I will reorganize the pictures. Earlier I said that I would post pictures when they became available (read: As I get all those old boxes gone through)so here is one. I also am putting a few on Family Enscussions if they seem to fit better there.
posted by David R. Snow at
Thursday, February 16, 2006
7 Comments:
The discriminating viewer may note that behind the rather stunning bride and beyond the brick wall of the church building is a rather fuzzy image of a 1947 sea-foam green plymouth with a weak engine and weaker tires. This is the very vehicle that was purchased for $60.00 US, driven from Abilene to Big Spring and back that Saturday for the wedding and then back to Big Spring that evening. At that point, the car was almost gone. I got a job that Monday, after moving into our first apartment (10.50 per week, upstairs with a bath at the end of the hall), at Mongomery Ward as a stock clerk, but was subsequently laid off at the end of the second week. My pay was in cash and was delivered in a little brown envelope with the calculations for hours, amount and taxes in handwriting each Friday. My hourly rate was ninty cents. Then I got a job repairing flat tires at a service station. The owner paid 50 cents per flat fixed and the tires then had tubes and had to be wrestled off the rims with what were called "tire tools" and a big hammer. They went on the same way and often times, if one were not very careful, the tube would be damaged in the installation, meaning a repeat process. Needless to say, even in those times, the 50 cents didn't always cover the sweat and skinned knuckes. Anyway, I remember at least a couple of times putting the plymouth on the rack and removing the pan and rod caps and placing newspaper under the inserts to eleminate the knocking of the old worn-out engine for a few more miles. The thing finally died for good and I think we left it with the station owner. When we gave up and went to Valley Mills on the bus. That is when I got a permant job with the USAF in Waco, on October 3, 1956. The pay was not much, but it was steady.
In re-reading this piece, I see lots of bad gramer, misspelling, etc., all things I would call my sociology students on. Maybe I should do these things in word until they are presentable and then cut and paste.
But then the spontainety (sp) would be lost.
Oh well .......
After you graduate you can just fall back on that ol' diploma when someone (besides Granny of course,because she knows better) says something about your grammar or spelling. It's us poor slaving college students who have to make sure we get it right.
Dave gave me five dollars, I found the material for $1.00 a yard (remember those days--occasionally WalMart still has something for that price) and I must have had the pattern. If I didn't, they were only 25-35 cents anyway. So I made it, and several years later I cut it up to line a coat for Nancy when she was about three. Never occurred to me to save it . . .
Walmart still has plenty of fabric for a dollar a yard, but nothing so beautiful...Do you perchance remember what you weighed back then? I know that is a rude question, but your figure is not that much smaller than what I am now, having lost a bunch of weight recently. How old were you on that day? What was that bouquet? It probably does not matter that you never saved the dress, as it is highly unlikely that your daughters would have fit into it the same way you did, or that they would have wanted to wear it. It was special for you that day though, because you made it for the occasion, and I would not have thought it homemade from the picture without your having told us.
Wasn't that the girls would have wanted the dress, just that often we save things that have sentimental meaning. I am probably too practical to do much of the saving except for pictures and small objects.
I weighed about 150. I remember that my waist was about 27" (waist measurement was a big thing then) and I thought I was huge, compared to people like my friend Joann there.
I was seventeen and a half. The bouquet was a gift from a friend who was married the day before. This was one economical wedding.
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