An Enduring Romance: Married!

Part One
Part Two
Part Three

The year at Provo was a happy and a busy one.

My two cousins, Anne Snow and Charlie Snow were with me and we rented rooms and kept house. We took as much food as we possibly could from home.

We made up a schedule for the household chores. We all took our schooling seriously and worked hard. I was able to do some work in the home economics room and this paid my home economics laboratory fees.

There were other people who were getting by with very little so we had company in that class.

We could not afford to go home at Christmas time. Instead, we spent the holidays in Lehi with aunts and uncles and cousins.

Just before Christmas we had some lessons in candy making. I sent a box of candy home and told them not to eat it until George came over. Then I wrote to George and told him I was sending the candy and maybe he could sample it if he went over there.

My brothers and sisters complained that there was very little candy left when he finished sampling.

That fall—1904—George was elected representative from Wayne County to the Utah State Legislature. It met in the early part of 1905 in Salt Lake City. While it was in session he came to Provo a few times and I went to Salt Lake a few times for parties, banquets and the theatre. When the session was over, he went home, but before he went we set the wedding date for June 7. I spent my spare time sewing and planning my wedding.

When school was out, I went to Lehi and spent a day or two with an aunt and uncle, and then I took the train for Salt Lake City.

I stayed in a hotel that night and we were married the next morning [June 7, 1905] in the Salt Lake Temple.

After our marriage, we went to Cottonwood and spent a few a few days with George’s sister and her husband, Sade and Jim Meeks. We also spent some time in and around Salt Lake.

It was the time of June Conference and quite a number of their activities were at Saltair.

One day we had been walking and resting in the park and we decided it would be nice to go across the street to a bakery and confectionary and buy something we could carry back to the park and eat instead of going to a restaurant.

When we decided what we wanted, I started to get it and then stopped. I asked George how much it would cost.

He said, “I don’t know. Why?”

I said, “Because if it costs more than thirty-five cents I haven’t got it.”

He looked a little surprised and them smiled and gave me some money. It was a standing joke in the family all through our married life.

However, I think I did well to go to school for a year, get a trousseau and get married, all for two hundred dollars.

1928

1955 Golden Wedding Anniversary

Grandma and Grandpa Stringam were married for over fifty years. Until his death in 1959. They had eleven children, nine of whom reached adulthood and produced families of their own. Their progeny numbers in the hundreds. They were examples of faith, devotion, kindness and generosity their entire lives. I have no doubt they are continuing their good works into the next life.

I miss them.