Families were friends, but fire took a bit to catch

Carolyn Wilkins went to a party hosted by Toney Abbott’s family because she had to. But she went out with him later because she wanted to.

Toney’s family wanted to use Carolyn’s family’s private lake, Wilkins Lake in north Pulaski County, for a Home Extension party in August 1964.

“Someone from our family had to go so that they could have the party out there,” she says. “My family and his family have known each other our entire lives — as in I knew who they were and he knew who I was.”

Toney went to Jacksonville High School, and Carolyn went to North Little Rock High School. Their fathers were childhood friends and Carolyn’s grandfather lived near Toney’s father. Through all of their familial connections, they had seen each other countless times growing up.

“She never had really caught my eye as somebody I would go out with,” Toney says. “But from talking to her that day, I knew we had similar interests.”

So, as some of their friends swam and others made ice cream, all a fair distance from the adults chatting in the pavilion, he asked if she would go out with him.

They saw The Pink Panther on their first date.

“It was sort of stupid, but we did have fun,” Carolyn says.

She worked at the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission in Little Rock after high school while he finished his senior year in Jacksonville. After he started classes at Arkansas State Teachers College in Conway (now the University of Central Arkansas) he was thrilled to learn she had been offered a job on campus.

“She did my laundry,” he quips. “After she got the job on campus I saw her all the time and I was ready to go forward and take the next step and get married.”

On their way to Little Rock to see Doctor Zhivago in late November 1966, Carolyn noticed that Toney carefully locked the glove box.

When the movie was over and he took her home — into the living room of her mother’s house where her brother was sprawled out on the floor watching television — Toney asked Carolyn if she would marry him. He had managed to unlock the glove compartment and take out the ring without her noticing.

“My brother never missed a flick of the TV,” Carolyn laughs.

They exchanged their vows on April 1, 1967, in Baring Cross Baptist Church in North Little Rock.

“Our wedding was big for its time and place,” she says.

Carolyn and Toney have four children — Amber Long, Karen Pieroni, David Abbott and Bryan Abbott, all of Cabot. They also have eight grandchildren.

Carolyn retired in 2009 as the manager of a pre-retirement education department at the Arkansas Teacher Retirement System. Toney retired in 2003 as principal of Pinewood Elementary in Jacksonville.

They are planning a trip down the Danube River to celebrate their 50th anniversary this year.

They didn’t specifically choose April Fool’s Day as their wedding day, but humor is a big part of their marriage. Toney jokes that he gave Carolyn one long-stemmed red rose for their first anniversary and two for their second. For their third anniversary, he says, he gave her a rose bush.

“She has her own flowers now,” he chuckles.

“He’s a big joker,” is Carolyn’s response. “We don’t pull any jokes on each other, but we make fun of the bad times and love the good times.”

Special to the Democrat-Gazette Toney and Carolyn Abbott were married on April 1, 1967. “My parents were married on Christmas Eve, so I knew you never forget your anniversary as far as it slipping up on you when it’s on a big holiday like April Fool’s Day,” Toney says.

Special to the Democrat-Gazette Carolyn and Toney Abbott met at a party his parents threw at her family’s lake. “She had on a swimsuit and she had a big bruise on her leg because she had been water skiing and fell on the water pretty hard the weekend before,” he says. “It was a large...