It is no secret that a large percentage of St. Lawrence Alumni get married to each other. You didn’t know that? Well, you better get over to the Ticker and start networking. The time is ticking. Kidding. Kinda. The following are two love stories that began at SLU.
Let’s take it back to 1960.
It’s a snowy NoCo December day and the social chair of ATO is requesting every member’s date for their winter formal. A senior, Bruce, invited his brother Stuart to attend the event. His brother was in need of a date so Bruce asked his girlfriend at the time if she knew of any cute girls interested in going. Bruce’s girlfriend told him about a freshman named Ann. Stuart and Ann went to the winter formal together but Bruce couldn’t keep his eyes off of her.
Yikes, I know.
Flash forward four years, both Ann and Bruce had graduated SLU and were living in New York City. It was 6pm on a Monday night in the fall of 1964 when Ann got a call. It was Bruce asking her out to dinner the upcoming Friday night. Four days past and Bruce laid his eyes on Ann once again, but this time under the clock at the Biltmore Hotel. They have been together ever since.
This next story is about their daughter Lynne.
Flash forward 26 years, it is 1986.
Convocation on the first day of orientation is in large room with hundreds of people. Hank, a future member of the lacrosse and soccer teams and a member of SAE fraternity, only noticed one person in the room. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of the stunning blonde sitting in the row in front of him. Hank was determined, he spent the entire day trying to figure out how to talk to her.
Her name was Lynne, a future member of the riding team and a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma. She was sitting with her parents Ann and Bruce.
That night, Hank saw Lynne sitting by the bar at the Hoot Owl. That was his chance. He said to her “Do you know John Keller?”. Hank had completely made up that name just as an excuse to talk to Lynne and pretend they had a mutual friend.
Nine months later, on the last day of their freshman year, they had their first kiss. They were hanging out by the river and they both knew they couldn’t wait the entire summer before sharing that moment. Their junior year, Lynne invited Hank to her KKG Winter formal. The following week they spent a winter escape up in Lake Placid together before Lynne went abroad to Vienna. They wrote each other letters constantly while she was away and have been together ever since.
In August of 2016, Hank and Lynne attended convocation at St. Lawrence with their daughter: me.
My dad turned to me and said “don’t be shy, meet as many people as you can today”. He paused, gave my mom a huge smile, and said “you never know who you will meet, I met your mother, the love of my life, on this day 30 years ago”.
(A text between Hank and Lynne on Feb. 10, 2018)
SLU is an incredible place that forms everlasting relationships. I know this because I am living proof that these relationships have the power to create ultimate joy and even more saints. I am Hank and Lynne’s daughter, my grandparents are Ann and Bruce and I have first-hand felt the love of their marriages.
Now be vulnerable, talk to the cute guy at the bar even if you have to make up a mutual friend like my dad did.
SLU truly has the love bug and I am pretty positive you’ll catch it.
Happy Valentine’s Day!