Fearless Female: Marriage

The Fearless Female prompts were created and posted at The Accidental Genealogist

The 4th and 5th prompts are on marriage with grandparents/great-grandparents, etc., and how they met. I do have records and some pictures of my grandparents marriage, but I really want to share my favorite story of how my paternal grandparents met, as told to me by my grandfather’s sister.

Before my grandfather’s funeral, the officiate did a unique thing (to me anyway) where the close family all came and sat in a circle and shared stories about my grandfather. It was an awesome way to remember him and I really think he would have loved that.

My aunt, his sister, told the story of how they met. I felt it was so completely my grandfather and I loved it! This is from memory so I’m not positive I’m going to get all the details correct, but the essential parts are there.

My grandmother worked at a store and my grandfather had to stop by for a delivery. The manager (owner?) asked my grandfather if he’d help him out with a problem he had. Apparently there was a leak in the basement that caused quite a mess so he asked if my grandfather could help clean it up. He said yes of course and went downstairs to start cleaning up the mess. A little while later, my grandmother came down to see if she could help – and found my grandfather cleaning up the mess with what was available around him – disposable pads.

I can picture my grandmother nearly falling over with laughter but not wanting to embarrass my grandfather who really meant well! Everything turned out wonderfully, (obviously, since I exist) as this picture – one of my favorites of the two of them – shows:

Do any of you have good stories about how a couple in your family met?