2/13/2010 10:00:00 PM A LOVE STORY: 76 years in the making
Roy and Alice Welch, who celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary this past September in Chino Valley, discuss the secret to the longevity of their marriage and some experiences they’ve shared through the years.
Matt Hinshaw/The Daily Courier Roy and Alice Welch embrace each other at their home in Chino Valley this past Tuesday.
CHINO VALLEY - Roy Welch couldn't help himself. Some 76 years ago, while driving down - and backing up on - Gurley Street next to the Elks Theater in downtown Prescott, he spotted a young girl about his age, and didn't think twice about asking her out on a date.
Never mind that Welch came on rather strong to someone he had not met before. As it turns out, Alice liked Roy's aggressive approach. They watched the 1929 Claudette Colbert movie "The Lady Lies" together at the theater and the rest is, well, history.
As millions of Americans celebrate Valentine's Day today, those couples that are in serious relationships might want to ponder the definition of lasting love. One thing's for certain - the Welches have known what it means for a long time.
In September 1934, eight months after their chance meeting on Jan. 7 of that year, Roy and Alice married in a church in Cottonwood, and they've been together ever since, through thick and (extremely) thin.
The couple celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary this past fall with 23 family members at their youngest daughter's Chino Valley home.
Roy, 94, and Alice, 93, still have clear memories about their initial encounter. Alice said that as she and her girlfriend started across Gurley Street, Roy and a buddy pulled up abruptly on the road, which was covered with gravel then.
"I backed up and wouldn't let her go around the car," Roy said from the couple's longtime house in northwest Chino Valley this past week. "Then she went around the front of the car and I drove up right in the middle of the street there on Gurley."
Added Alice with a chuckle, "He said he wanted to take me to the theater and I said (to my girlfriend), 'Well, it will save us a dime.'"
***
In the 1950s and '60s, the Welches loved to go fishing in area lakes and joined a square dancing club in Prescott. Roy even enjoyed deer hunting.
Their similar interests have been a strong point of their marriage.
"We liked getting with other people and meeting new people," said Alice, who has a group picture of them and their square dancing friends from the mid-1960s.
For 20 years, the couple would square dance at the old Fairgrounds and at the Courthouse Plaza. Alice sewed Roy's shirts and her own dresses to match.
"Dancing's kind of like shopping - it's hard to quit," Roy said with a slight Southern drawl.
***
At the time she met Roy, Alice lived off Goodwin Street near where the city library is today, while her mother resided in nearby Jerome. Alice was staying with her cousin and attending school.
Born in Wyoming, Alice moved to Prescott with her mom, Della Beebe, at age 6 after her parents separated. Her uncle lived here.
"We stayed around Prescott until I met Roy, and he dragged me all over the country," Alice said wryly.
Shortly after the Welches got married, they labored for the Works Project Administration - one of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs designed to recharge the economy during the Great Depression. They worked four days a week (all that was allowed) and earned $49 a month.
Roy later traveled to California to pick fruit before returning in the early 1940s to Arizona, where he worked for eight years at the mines in Morenci extracting copper for munitions used during World War II.
He then became a union carpenter and also did roadwork around the Yavapai County Courthouse, which included installing curbs and sidewalks. Roy built homes in Phoenix, Safford, Tucson and Prescott.
Alice, meanwhile, was a homemaker and seamstress who made dress shirts for Morris Mallor, which had a union shop in Prescott. (She said she still receives a union check of $40.32 a month.)
"I worked there for 15 to 20 years and retired from there," Alice said of the shop, which was off Arizona and Sheldon streets. "I liked it."
The Welches eventually had three daughters, including Paula Wesson, their youngest child, who still lives up the street from them in Chino.
"They traveled around, but they always came back here," Paula said of her parents.
***
Roy, a native of San Angelo, Texas, and Alice have had peaks and valleys in their marriage, just like every other committed couple. But they chugged through the deepest of those valleys. One of those moments came in 1944 when the Welches' daughter, Barbara, died from meningitis when she was just 16 months old. Roy and Alice said they think doctors prescribed too many sulfa drugs for Barbara, which ultimately killed her. They still keep a framed portrait of Barbara in their bedroom.
Six decades later, in 2000, tragedy struck again when eldest daughter Dorothy and her husband were shot and killed while showing a motor home in the desert outside Kingman.
"We've stuck together," Alice said. "You have to learn to take a lot and you have to give a lot."
***
These days, Roy is limited to the types of activities he can do because he's on oxygen. Alice and Roy used to regularly smoke cigarettes and it caught up with the latter.
"I tried to get him to quit smoking when I had a heart attack, which the doctor said was caused by smoking," said Alice, who suffered the attack in the mid-1980s. "But he didn't do it."
Paula said her dad's health has been "iffy" for the past 20 years, but the love he has for Alice keeps him going.
Roy and Alice also have six grandchildren and 19 great-grandchildren who live close by to keep them happy. Alice still does most of the couple's laundry and all of the cooking.
"I think they're so competitive, they're not going to let one go without the other," Paula said of her parents.
Today, on Valentine's Day, Alice said she expects a couple gifts, per usual, from Roy.
"He better buy me some roses and chocolates," Alice said.
To which Roy responded, "I'll get her some roses."
You bet he will.
Reader Comments
Posted: Sunday, February 14, 2010
Article comment by:
Tom & Dee Dee Fields
God Bless you for your stamina and love.
Posted: Sunday, February 14, 2010
Article comment by:
H H
Very nice story. My grandparents were married 60+ years before they passed away. It's nice to know that in the world these days, there are still wonderful and happily married couples of manys years. I hope one day to be in the same happily married (for many,many years) boat.
Posted: Sunday, February 14, 2010
Article comment by:
An Admirer
God bless you folks. 75 years is a nearly unreachable milestone. Congratulations.
