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A potpourri of stories about various family members or events
Our Wedding Day
The morning of June 3, 1978, was a sunny, nice start to the day. It wasn't too hot or too cool. The evening before, we had a potluck gathering of the wedding participants in our wedding, who ate supper in a park in the NW part of St. Cloud, and then we drove not too far to Green Pasture's Church for a rehearsal. If I recall correctly, one of Marcia's aunts, Helen, was at the Hopkins home helping with the final stitching on some part of Marcia's dress that she had sewn. We had photos scheduled to be taken in the late morning at Munsinger Gardens, using the portion closest to the 10th Street Bridge. The next day, Marcia and I drove to Grand Rapids and then to the cabin for our honeymoon.
Since I had everything ready that I needed for the day, I figured this was a good time to install some speakers in our Datsun 510 (see below). This would be useful for our long drive north, I thought. I had purchased 4 new speakers in the previous days. First, I replaced the current speakers in the front car doors, which was fairly straightforward. Testing the new cassette player showed that these two worked. Installing some in the panels in the trunk space was a bit more of a challenge that required cutting out holes (Goldilocks' size -- not too big or too small) for the speakers in the rear panels, running the wire, and installing the grills. While not hard, this task took more time than I had expected.
Our decorated 510 (back when I thought color photographs were too expensive).
A side view of the car when I realized that color photographs were not too expensive.
I got the car's new speakers ready in time, took a shower, and then headed out to pick up Marcia for the photos. My Mom and Dad came on their own, and the whole wedding party met near the 10th Street Bridge. The photo shoot went well, except that before the first shot, Marcia saw a mosquito on the upper left side of my suit. Trying to help me, she swatted it, but left a little bit of a stain. We were able to get most of it out, and then the shooting began.
Marcia, the beautiful bride
(LTR) Marcia, sisters Nona and Jo, and Kathy Wilson
(LTR) Steve Hess, Paul Harkness, Marvin McDonald, Al
Marcia and I with our parents
At this point, 47 years later, I don't recall what we did for lunch, but I think it was likely some meal at Harold's and Gladys' home. Perhaps Aunt Helen was still finishing some stitching on the veil Marcia was going to wear.
We then headed to Green Pastures Church, which was west of Waite Park, and the service began at 1:30 (see the program below). The next hour was a blur, but we had opening songs, a sharing by our pastor (Helmar Heckel), a sharing of our commitments to each other, lighting of the wedding candle, and the declaration of being married. The reception was simple and held in the same location right afterwards. The front wall had recently had its beautiful mural completed by Kathy Wilson.
Harold turns over Marcia to me
Background mural by Kathy while we listen to Helmar.
Service program
I am not sure who, but someone assumed responsibility to decorate our car with shaving cream signage (see first photo above). Someone else (Norm? or Ken?) took it upon himself to help us transport some of the rocks from the church parking lot to a location much further north. He put some rocks inside one or more hubcaps of our car. The rattling was only noticed when starting up or slowing down, and since I had never heard of such a stunt, I was a bit slow to deduce what was happening.
Choosing not to drive north and arriving in the dark, we spent our first night together in our new apartment in St. Joseph. We then left for Grand Rapids, spent a night at a hotel there, and then went to the cabin and spent several days there. While we thought we had brought all the groceries needed for the cabin, we soon realized that our breakfast of pancakes required an egg, which we forgot. We took a walk and found someone at the McLeod cabin, and they "loaned" us one.
The choices of having a picnic instead of a rehearsal dinner, not having a meal or dance after the wedding (however, there was a cake and snacks), and the choice for Marcia to sew her wedding dress were all decided by our budget. At this point in our lives, neither of us had much money (Marcia more than me), and Marcia had just graduated from college, but I still had another year and a half. Harold offered us a sum of $300, and we stayed within that amount for the wedding. In hindsight, we should have used more of our own money or delayed the wedding until we had more resources, but we knew that we both had a summer job (Big Oaks Campground) and Marcia was going to start teaching in the fall.
Published 2025-06-03. Revised 2025-07-05.
If you find any error(s) in the text, please let me know. Thanks. Contact me with errors or comments using hibbardac@gmail. [Back to the top] [About the author, Al]
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