I met my wife-to-be in about 1940. Her name was Ann Ruffin. We hit it off. After a year of dating we got married, and the bigger romance began. We were married 62 years! It would have been 63 years but she passed away in January, 2005. Her heart blew out. It was tough.

While we were married we had twelve pregnancies. One of them, a boy of about two years old, died of hydro encephalitis. We took him to children’s hospital in Columbus. They put in a shunt but it didn’t work.

Another one was stillborn.

But we had seven healthy girl babies and three boys. They grew up to be healthy, kids and adults. The youngest is 40 or 41; the oldest is 61.

All went to college except for one.

Needless to say we didn’t take a vacation every year or heat out every other night or even every week. It was a matter of self-control, which very few people have. Economic self-control, anyway.

Ann graduated from Ohio State also. Her degree was in social administration. I had a degree in business administration; I was marketing major.