“We never did anything unless we asked each other,” said Garnet, 92. “We agreed on everything we were going to do.”
The Mason Christian Village residents first met in the summer of 1938 at Cincinnati’s Ault Park.
“They had dances there,” Harry, 95, said. “She looked pretty cute.”
Garnet agreed to meet Harry at the park the next week but sprained her ankle, making bus travel difficult. A friend borrowed a parent’s car and drove Garnet, her sister and a friend to the dance, where Harry asked for a second date.
“They all liked him. They thought he was OK,” she said.
Sure there was an attraction, but was it love at first sight?
“Evidently,” Garnet said with a laugh. “He never went with anybody else after that, and I didn’t either.
“He was good looking and a real gentleman. I just knew he was the one,” she said.
The two dated for nearly three years before purchasing a $5 ring at a Northside jewelry store and marrying in February 1941, just before Harry left for a four-month stint with Wright Aeronautical in New Jersey.
Soon after, Harry joined the U.S. Army Air Corps and was stationed in Australia under the command of Gen. Douglas MacArthur.
Meanwhile, Garnet purchased a $6,350 two-bedroom home for them and told Harry about the surprise via a hand-crafted valentine with her image glued atop a photograph of the house.
The couple wrote letters to each other every day, and when Harry returned in 1945 they set about starting a family.
Kathy arrived in 1945, Jeannine in 1951, and Hal in 1955. Eight grandchildren and three great-grandchildren have rounded out the family.
Keeping a healthy relationship through decades of marriage means keeping the peace, Garnet said.
“We don’t always agree, but we finally come to a conclusion and we never go to bed mad,” she said. “Somehow or other, we just got along.”
The couple said they continue to count their blessings.
“We have a wonderful family and are blessed to have reached our 70th anniversary,” Garnet said. “God has been good to us.”
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