Valentine’s Day
Stories of Love
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A couple in their front yard, c. 1940s |
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Happy Valentine’s Day! It is a day that evokes stories of love—it may be young love, true love, love at first sight, and love that grew over time. Let’s take a look in The HistoryMakers’ archives for these love stories.
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Left: George Keith Martin and his wife, Anita, with their three daughters, undated
Right, left to right: James B. Lockhart’s parents, Edgar Lockhart and Margaret Lockhart; James B. Lockhart; Reba Noble; Reverend Parker; Reba's mother, Millie Noble; her brother, Handy Noble; and her grandmother, Carrie Noble; James and Reba Lockhart’s wedding, 1959
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For lawyer George Keith Martin, Valentine’s Day is the day he met his future wife, Anita L. Martin: “The irony is I met Anita at a… Valentine's Day party… and we got engaged on Valentine's Day as well.”[1] Valentine’s Day was an important holiday for corporate executive James B. Lockhart as well: “I was assigned to Chicago [Illinois] in December '59 [1959] and then kept calling her to quit her [his first wife, Reba Noble] job in at New York Hospital and come on out to Chicago. And so on Valentine's Day is when she came out to Chicago; I'll never forget it. Actually, we made every move on Valentine's Day thereafter. We bought a house on Valentine's Day and bought a second house on Valentine's Day every five years.”[2]
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Left: Couple dancing, undated
Right, left to right: Alexander “Gene” Barber, Jr., Sondra Akins, Alexander Barber holding baby Christine Barber, Mabel Savannah Sharpe Barber, and Freddie Barber, c. 1950
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Chemist Sondra Akins recalled her parents meeting at Winston-Salem Teachers College over a bag of peanuts: “My mother [Mabel Savannah Sharpe Barber] had come to school, supposedly to study to be a teacher (laughter)… eighteen [years old]. By that time, my father [Alexander Eugene Barber] was twenty-six. And… he was driving for the [college] president. And my mother… thought he was quite handsome (laughter). He was eating peanuts, and she said, ‘I'd like to have some peanuts.’ And he did not give her any, but the next week, apparently, he had this big bag of peanuts (laughter) that he gave her. And they had a very short courtship… it's written that their first date was Valentine's Day, 1937 or '36 [1936] … they danced to ‘Pennies from Heaven’ [by Johnny Burke and Arthur Johnston, 1936]. Well, by the time the school year ended, they had decided to get married, and the rest really is history… they had been married sixty-six years.”[3]
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A couple reading together, undated |
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Judge Glenda Hatchett’s parents also met at college: “One Sunday morning, my mom [Clemmie Barnes Hatchett] was in the cafeteria at Atlanta University getting… breakfast… And my dad [Paul Hatchett, Sr.] said, ‘(Gasps) I wanna meet her…’ And [his then-roommate] Uncle Al says, ‘No, no, mate, you can't just run over there. She's a schoolteacher… You gotta show some class, and you need to go get a newspaper…’ So my dad runs out of the… dining hall… And he goes and grabs a Sunday newspaper, and he runs back and he invites my mother to go and sit outside under this tree and read the newspaper… then he says to my mother, ‘Would you like to go to church?’ So… every Sunday morning they would have breakfast together… and read the Sunday paper, and they would go to church. That was June of 1948. June of 1949 they got married. My dad came Christmastime and asked my grandparents [Hattie Barnes and Leon Barnes] for my mother's hand… Every Sunday--I don't know how he timed it… We're talking about U.S. special delivery. My dad would send my mother a special delivery letter… and she would always get it before she went to church every Sunday, until the Sunday before they got married. My mother has them in a box, in chronological order, of these love letters that he sent her.”[4]
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The story of choreographer Eleo Pomare’s (1937 - 2008) parents, Tawny Forbes and Mildred Pomare, was one of forbidden love on the island of San Andres, Colombia: “I'm the product of two feuding families, the Pomares and the Forbes, and my father was a Forbes… it dates back… to slavery… during the time when that area was being colonized… two different colonialists started families… the two largest families on the island. And so it was about property, land, money, and complexion… The Forbes were the poor and the Pomares were above… she was forbidden to be with my father. And so they ran away to the mainland of Colombia.”[5]
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Queen’s Park Oval Cricket Club, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago (left); and Dr. Wayne A.I. Frederick with his wife, Simone Frederick, and children, 2015 (right) |
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Howard University president Dr. Wayne A. I. Frederick talked about the similarity of his love story with that of his parents: “My mom [Frances Tyson-Hill] and dad [Alix Frederick] met in a very similar way to how I met my wife [Simone Frederick] … around carnival time in Trinidad my mom was at an event at an area called Queen's Park Oval [Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago] … She was leaving… My father was on duty on his horse and saw my mom and offered to escort her back… and told her that he'd be back the next day to meet her. Came back the next day… and she wasn't there. So he proceeded to sit and write a letter to her… And so she said that she thought he was crazy and scary enough that she did wait for him the next day (laughter). And the rest, as they say, is history… My wife and I met in almost the same area… It was carnival time… and I actually walked her home… I left her with my chain and the engagement ring that my dad gave my mom as a reason to come back and see her the next day… when I went back later that evening, her mom gave me back my chain and engagement ring and told me that she went out. I was pretty disappointed. And the next day I was leaving for the airport to go back to Houston [Texas], and so I stopped by and met her, had a conversation with her. That was February 13th… and the next day was Valentine's Day. We probably spent seven hours on the phone overnight. And in a similar fashion, as they say, the rest of it is history.”[6]
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Ted V. Wells and Nina M. Wells, undated (left); and a film poster of ‘Fahrenheit 451,’ 1966 (right) |
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Power-lawyer couple Theodore V. Wells and Nina Wells shared both sides of their story in their interviews. Ted Wells said: “I met my wife in high school… she went to… that all-girls Catholic school in D.C. called Immaculate Conception Academy… we had rented a bus and we're going to see the Baltimore Bullets play [now the Washington Wizards] … and I'll never forget she said, ‘He's a hoodlum and all his friends are hoodlums.’ And… I probably had a little bit of both… But… she finally agreed to go out on a date with me. And we went to the movies. We saw 'Fahrenheit 451' … then she took me to a basketball game… I'm lucky I met her. I met her at sixteen and didn't let her go (laughter).”[7] Nina M. Wells added in her version of their story: “At the time… I told him I… wasn't interested… he kept calling me… I used to say, ‘You're just a hoodlum, and your friends are hoodlums.’ But… he was so nice, and he was so well dressed… at first my father [Ignatius Mitchell, Jr.] did not like him… once my father met Ted's mother, he said, ‘Oh, she's really lovely.’ And then… Ted's family, once we started dating… would join us for Christmas… We were going to get married in the Catholic church, and… we knew we needed to have a certain amount of money to get married in the church and then have a reception… We had no money. So we said… we're just going to get married on Christmas day [1971] … at my mother's house so we didn't tell anyone. We told my mother [Pearline Jackson Smith] … so she made a wedding cake, and… the minister came after dinner. It was just our immediate families and a few of Ted's friends from college, my sisters. The whole wedding was fifty dollars including the dress… My sister brought some carnations, some champagne. Ted borrowed a dashiki… we went to the Holiday Inn that night. And no honeymoon… off we went.”[8]
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Curt Flood, c. 1960s (left); and Judy Pace, c. 1960s (right) |
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Actress Judy Pace-Flood told of her first date with baseball legend and her future husband Curt Flood: “I did the premiere show of 'The Dating Game' and… I was the bachelorette… one of the bachelors was Willie Mays… and Curt [Flood] saw that Willie Mays was going to be on the dating game… and that's when he saw me… and he said… he had seen the prettiest little chocolate girl he had ever seen… He found out that I was with the William Morris Agency… got my agent, Sy Marsh… was a baseball fan… So, he gave Curt my number… he [Curt Flood] continues to call me… I'm calling Sy [Marsh] asking him why he gave him my number, and he's trying to explain to me who Curt Flood is… sending me baseball cards, newspaper articles, photos… then, my dad [Edward Pace] finds out and so him and my dad strike up these conversations when he calls… this goes on all the way until the World Series time, which is like almost a year he's been keeping this up and my dad… said, ‘You really need to go out with this young man...’ So, he calls and I tell Curt, ‘Okay… we can go out, but we have to go somewhere public because I don't know who you are… we have to have a chaperone.’ So, he gets World Series tickets for my family and his father [Herman Flood]. So, he calls back and he says, ‘Is Dodgers Stadium public enough, and if your father and your mother [Kitty Griffin Pace] and my father go, is that enough of a chaperone?’ and what are you gonna say? I said, ‘Well, yeah okay that will work,’ and that was our first date.”[9]
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A boy and girl walking home from school, c. 1950s |
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King V. Cheek, Jr., former president of Shaw University and Morgan State University, spoke of a young love while growing up in Greensboro, North Carolina: “This young girl was also a celebrity. She had her own radio show… And she was a gospel singer… So she was kind of a child star… and very cute… she came to me… in class, and asked me if I had a girlfriend. And I told her, ‘No.’ And so then she said, ‘Well, you do now.’ And that's how our relationship began… Every Sunday afternoon, after her concert, I took wildflowers to her home… she was one of seventeen children, and her family and I became very close. And we still are today.”[10]
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Virginia & William Maynor on their wedding day, June 5, 2010 |
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Love can be found at any stage of life. Just ask educator Virginia Edwards Maynor, who told us her story of finding love later in life: “In 2009, I went to a class reunion [at Albert E. Beach High School, Savannah, Georgia] that I had not planned to attend but my aunt encouraged me to go… I'd been single for twenty-one years and she said, ‘You just don't know who you might meet.’ I said, ‘There's nobody in my class that I would ever,’ (laughter), ‘think about meeting.’ So… I finally told her… ‘Okay, I'll go.’ …and sitting there, this young man… came into the room… and I asked one of our classmates, I said, ‘Isn't that William Maynor,’ and somebody said, ‘No, that's not him.’ I said, ‘Oh, I think that is him.’ So later in the evening… he saw me and when he did, he just, ‘Oh, is that you?’ We hadn't seen each other in forty-six years. When we were in high school, we'd wave and smile at each other but we actually met in the Star Theatre [Savannah, Georgia] in 1958 when my girlfriend and I were there watching… some Western movie… he and his friend were sitting behind us and they were being… pesty… and I didn't see him anymore until junior high school and then high school, but we never talked on the telephone… [or] on school grounds, it was always from a distance, a smile. And in 2009, here we are and we started courting, talking about our past experiences… somebody said it was an O-M-G moment… and we got married in 2010. So that's the love story.”[11]
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A scene from the silent film ‘Something Good-Negro Kiss,’ 1898 |
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In honor of Valentine’s Day, spend time with loved ones and reflect on the sweet memories that love creates! |
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[1] George Keith Martin (The HistoryMakers A2016.120), interviewed by Larry Crowe, December 6, 2016, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 6, George Keith Martin talks about his marriage.
[2] James B. Lockhart (The HistoryMakers A2004.135), interviewed by Larry Crowe, August 19, 2004, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 3, story 9, James B. Lockhart recalls marrying Reba Noble in 1959.
[3] Sondra Akins (The HistoryMakers A2012.108), interviewed by Larry Crowe, May 15, 2012, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 1, story 8, Sondra Akins talks about how her parents met, and describes their long marriage and employment at Winston-Salem Teachers College.
[4] The Honorable Glenda Hatchett (The HistoryMakers A2016.043), interviewed by Larry Crowe, October 5, 2016, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 2, story 2, The Honorable Glenda Hatchett describes how her parents met.
[5] Eleo Pomare (The HistoryMakers A2007.147), interviewed by Larry Crowe, April 18, 2007, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 1, story 5, Eleo Pomare describes the feud between his maternal and paternal families; Eleo Pomare (The HistoryMakers A2007.147), interviewed by Larry Crowe, April 18, 2007, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 1, story 8, Eleo Pomare describes how his parents met.
[6] Dr. Wayne A. I. Frederick (The HistoryMakers A2017.012), interviewed by Larry Crowe, January 30, 2017, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 1, story 7, Dr. Wayne A. I. Frederick talks about how his parents met.
[7] Theodore V. Wells, Jr. (The HistoryMakers A2007.175), interviewed by Julieanna L. Richardson, May 15, 2007, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 4, story 4, Theodore V. Wells, Jr. remembers dating his wife; Theodore V. Wells, Jr. (The HistoryMakers A2007.175), interviewed by Julieanna L. Richardson, May 15, 2007, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 4, story 5, Theodore V. Wells, Jr. talks about his wife.
[8] Nina M. Wells (The HistoryMakers A2014.216), interviewed by Julieanna L. Richardson, September 11, 2014, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 2, story 8, Nina M. Wells remembers dating her husband; Nina M. Wells (The HistoryMakers A2014.216), interviewed by Julieanna L. Richardson, September 11, 2014, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 2, story 10, Nina M. Wells describes her experiences at Newton College of the Sacred Heart.
[9] Judy Pace-Flood (The HistoryMakers A2005.085), interviewed by Larry Crowe, March 29, 2005, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 3, story 6, Judy Pace-Flood remembers how appearing on 'The Dating Game' led to Curt Flood contacting her; Judy Pace-Flood (The HistoryMakers A2005.085), interviewed by Larry Crowe, March 29, 2005, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 3, story 7, Judy Pace-Flood talks about her first date with Curt Flood at Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles, California.
[10] King V. Cheek, Jr. (The HistoryMakers A2004.075), interviewed by Racine Tucker Hamilton, June 14, 2004, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 1, story 9, King Cheek remembers an elementary school love interest.
[11] Virginia Edwards Maynor (The HistoryMakers A2017.050), interviewed by Denise Gines, February 10, 2017, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 2, Virginia Edwards Maynor talks about her second marriage.
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