Eighty-Two and Counting

It rained. They moved the service inside. Her grandfather, by then a bishop, performed the ceremony. His father made his last public appearance before succumbing to tuberculosis a half-year later.

He had courted her in the car he had reconstructed after he bought it for ten dollars from a Cumberland University Law student, rebuilding the engine and putting on a wood chassis while he was in high school.

He had quit high school in 1934 before his senior year to work at an automobile dealership to support his family after his father could no longer work.

After she had graduated from high school, she had refused an offer to play for the Nashville Business College’s AAU Women’s Basketball team because she knew some other girls in town had their eye on him, and she didn’t want to risk losing him.

It was July 2, 1938 at the First Methodist Church on East Main in Lebanon, Tennessee.

Today is the eighty-second anniversary of their wedding. They were here through seventy-five of those. He passed away forty-three days after that. She hung around for nine more months before joining him.

i will always miss them.

Estelle Prichard and Jimmy Jewell in Shelby Park, Nashville, 1937:

Jimmy and Estelle Jewell, 2012:

1 thought on “Eighty-Two and Counting

  1. Jim, you were so lucky to have them for so long. They were obviously great parents and had a love affair for over 75 years.

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