It’s quiet in here
He didn’t pay much attention...at first.
Emma Petty was a quiet girl, and she usually had a book in her hand. She was also pretty, but to be honest, when I went to her house one Saturday afternoon in the summer of 1954, I wasn’t expecting to ask her on a date.
I wanted to go to a baseball game with her brother Paul. He wasn’t home, so I asked Emma to go with me instead. I found out later through her sisters that she didn’t intend to go out with me, either. When she disappeared in the house, supposedly to ask her mother’s permission, she was looking for an excuse to politely decline. But her mother and sisters convinced her to go out with me and have fun.
Our car ride into town was a quiet one. We were both happy not to have to fill the ride with chatter. We didn’t mind just sitting together. That was our first date.
There wasn’t much to do in Mount Juliet, but soon we spent time together however we could. We attended church and more ballgames together, and we loved going to the malt shop. We rarely went to the movies—my job paid only 50 cents a day and the movies cost a quarter.
I quickly came to realize that this quiet woman who always had a cross-stitch or a new book in her hand was the one I wanted to marry. One day I sneaked her class ring on my finger so I could figure out the right size for an engagement ring.
Before I left for Air Force boot camp, I asked her to marry me. She said, “I have to finish school first.” So we waited until she finished school. And then we waited a bit longer, because the Air Force trained me on a plane they decided to retire just as I was finishing up schooling on it.
Our Thanksgiving wedding was pushed back, but on Dec. 23, 1955, we married.
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