Happy Anniversary!

Today is the wedding anniversary of two of our Presidents and First Ladies!

George and Martha Washington married 260 years ago today in 1759. George and Barbara Bush married 74 years ago today in 1945. For both couples, it was love at first sight.

Martha, a young and wealthy widow with two young children, met the young military man at the home of mutual friends. They knew almost immediately that they were meant for each other. George not only fell in love with her but also with her young children, Jacky and Patsy. He proposed shortly after their first meeting, and, obviously, she accepted. They married about ten months after they first met at her family home which was named “White House”.

The General and his lady spent nearly 41 years together until his death on December 14, 1799. Even with the demands of his public service, they remained close and deeply in love. He enjoyed nothing more than being able to be home with her and their family. During the years of the Revolution, she spent time away from him acquiring and making necessary supplies for him and his men. Each year, she made the dangerous trip to be with him at his winter camp, taking those supplies and staying with him for as long as she could. By all accounts, the General anxiously looked forward to these visits, and he was much calmer and happier when she was around. When they needed to be apart, they wrote to each other frequently. After his death, she could not bring herself to return to the bedroom they had shared in their beloved home, Mount Vernon. Instead, she moved to a small, sparse room on the third floor of the house. Before her death on May 22, 1802, she managed to burn nearly all of the letters that they had exchanged over the years. She had shared him with the world in life; she did not want to share him in death. Only three of these letters accidentally escaped her. One was discovered stuck to the bottom of a drawer in a desk inherited by her namesake granddaughter. The General wrote it to her on June 18, 1775, as he prepared to take command of the Colonial Army. His words and his tone leave no doubt that they were deeply in love and devoted to each other.

George and Barbara Bush met at a country club dance. She was only 16, but she knew he was the one. He proposed after 18 months, and they married when he was home on leave from the Navy near the end of World War II. She often commented that she married the first and only man she ever kissed. They had 73 years together. They moved multiple times throughout their marriage, following his career, first in the oil business and then in service to our country in a wide variety of positions, culminating in his election to the Presidency. They had six children, five who lived to grow up. Their first daughter, Robin, died at only three years old of leukemia. Her death deeply affected both of them, and she remained a major part of their lives. They became only the second First Couple to see their son serve our country as President as well. They hold the record for having the longest marriage of any First Couple. George died on November 30, this past year, only seven months after Barbara’s death on April 17. One of their young great-granddaughters commented that he died right before Christmas because he had to be with her to decorate their tree; they had never spent a Christmas apart.