Local couple celebrates 70 years of wedded bliss

Anniversary brings memories of the start

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It may have been raining, snowing and otherwise gloomy outside on the afternoon of March 11, but it was all warmth and happiness inside Grace Community Church's social hall.

More than 100 family and friends gathered there to honor the 70th wedding anniversary of Earl and Mildred Burris.

There were decorations, entertainment, plenty of cake, punch and stories to go around to fill their three hours of renewed bliss. There was a table-full of scrapbooks, a chronology of photos that traced their wedded history back to the early 1930s before the young and energetic couple got hitched on March 9, 1936 in Yuma, Ariz.

The couple -- Earl is 92 and Mildred is 89 -- had planned to say their vows in their hometown of Los Angeles, but Earl's work schedule and the state's three-day waiting period were incompatible.

Although their marriage dates back to the days of Jesse Owens and Sonja Henie in the Olympic Games and the years preceding Hitler's march through Europe, the Burrises still have fond memories of their wedding night.

"The first night was normal except there was a stranger in my shack that had never been there before," said Earl, who lived in a marooned work outpost in California's Mojave Desert known as Rice, about 160 miles from Yuma. He also recalled that he had a three-burner stove, which only had one burner working. "There was a railroad track close by and Mildred had no idea there were trains in the area. One of them came through about midnight and she jumped up because it sounded like it was coming through the house."

Mildred's take on the story was a bit different.

"I remember when we got back from Yuma, I fixed supper and he had to go off to work so we never consummated the marriage that night. The next morning, when we did consummate it, the bed collapsed so he found a stool and put it under the bed so it wouldn't collapse. We laughed so hard because we'd been through so much the other day. So I really spent my wedding night all by myself."

When confronted with Mildred's version, Earl embellished the story further.

"Yeah, the bed collapsed and the headboard came this way and the footboard came this way," he said as he demonstrated a folding-in motion. "It was a heck of a thing, but we finally did it."

The couple have two children -- 65-year-old Walter Burris and 61-year-old Melinda Russell -- who have given them five grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

Russell said the most remarkable thing about her parents' 70 years together was that they managed to put up with each other. She said they lived in an atmosphere where they did things together as a family and thinks the one thing they stand for are the values they instill.

Walter Burris, too, finds his mom and dad as good role models.

"They started out with nothing but a one-room pasteboard shack outside Needles (Calif.) ... and they saved enough money to buy a home in Portuguese Bend in 1951," he said of his parents, who he labeled as geniuses. "Dad had the highest government security clearances for years and knew things he couldn't begin to tell you or me. He was a sharp guy. And they were always active in church. They started a newlyweds group called the Partners Class at the First Baptist Church in Los Angeles in the 1930s and the classes are still there. Yes, they are remarkable people."

Earl said the 70 years has been a great experience, but the one thing he remembers the most about all those years is when his son was born in April 1939 and how a hospital nurse passing by nearly got inundated when Mildred's water broke.

Mildred, on the other hand, had a different answer when asked about her seven decades with the same man.

"I wouldn't want it any other way," she said. "He is sweet and does everything for me. He's even cooking right now."