Newlyweds

Young Marrieds at River House [July, 1961]

Dear George,

Katja and I were married fifty years ago this past Saturday. It’s hard to imagine. We were 23 at the time and viewed ourselves as grownups. Now I think we were closer to being babies. I can’t imagine how we undertook this major life step, much less how we survived it.

We got married in Yellow Springs on Aug. 28, 1960, had a one night honeymoon in Dayton, and moved a week later to Ann Arbor where we were beginning grad school. We arrived in Ann Arbor with an ill-founded snobbism from our undergraduate experience. Antioch was like a cloistered island in southern Ohio, surrounded by conservative communities (e.g., Cincinnati) whose media constantly attacked the campus as a leftwing stronghold. Antiochians consequently developed a strong in-group identification and maintained a sense of superiority to the external world. I initially viewed Michigan as a big and probably mediocre public university, though I soon discovered that it was an astonishing place and that my view of the academic world was seriously distorted.

We rented a second-floor apartment on Brookwood St. near campus in a house owned by 80-year-old Mrs. Quackenbush. Mrs. Q had been renting to Michigan students for decades, and she was a fair and business-like landlady, if a bit old school. Our apartment was tiny, but it was our first home and we loved it. I had retrieved a tree stump with all its roots from the Menominee River earlier in the summer, and we bought a round piece of glass and made it into a coffee table. We made another table out of a wooden whiskey crate that we’d bought for a dollar at the local state liquor store. Katja bought a big rocking chair with lion’s head arms from the Salvation Army for $8, and we still have it in our living room, though sheepdog puppies did some chewing on its legs.

Grad school was serious business, and I applied myself day and night. Katja delayed her plans to begin M.A. studies in French, and, to help support us, she took a job as a clerk at Faber’s Fabrics which had stores in downtown Ann Arbor and at Arborland. Katja became immersed in her new job, took weekly sewing lessons, and began turning out homemade shirts for me and napkins and tablecloths for our household. Between my graduate stipend of $1,450 for the year, a small monthly allowance from my parents, and Katja’s weekly salary, we were able to eat and pay the rent. We went out for lunch once a month at the Pretzel Bell, a famous Ann Arbor college hangout, and enjoyed prime roast beef sandwiches and gravy.

One day I came home, and there was a fuzzy little ball of black fluff that turned out to be a German Shepherd puppy named Heather. Katja thought we needed a third party to be a real family. We loved the little dog, and our non-work lives soon centered around her. Then a tragedy occurred. We’d left her in the care of a friend, who tied her up in the back yard, and Heather scaled a wire fence, tumbled over, and strangled to death. We were in a state of grief for a long time. It was our first occasion for dealing with a traumatic event as a married couple. We’re still sad when we think about it.

Antioch had prohibited intercollegiate athletics , and we thought it weird to be at a Big Ten school. Students, however, received free tickets to the football games, so we went to the first game of the season at Michigan Stadium, along with 100,000 others. Katja, despite not knowing much about football, loved the pageantry of it all. The game was exciting, and the halftime Michigan Marching Band was even better. After that first outing we only missed one or two home games during our six years in Ann Arbor. We even went now and then to watch the marching band practices which were held in a field a couple of blocks from our apartment. One enduring byproduct was that we came to hate Ohio State with a passion.

Managing money was scary to me, so I was happy when Katja volunteered to take care of our finances. We opened our first checking account at the Ann Arbor bank. Looking at it in hindsight, Katja was remarkably systematic and frugal. We, of course, didn’t have much money to spare. Consequently she only wrote checks for the amount of each single purchase. $4.89 here, $12.50 there, and so on. We’d been in Ann Arbor for about six months when we stopped at the bank to cash a check, and the clerk at the window said that the branch manager wanted to talk to us. Puzzled, we went into his office. He explained that the bank’s board of directors had spent their entire February meeting discussing policy issues regarding our account. It turned out that we were averaging over thirty cashed checks a month, mostly for amounts under ten dollars, and the bank’s costs in processing our account were excessive. I can’t believe they were that excessive, but it apparently was a very serious matter for the bank. The manager explained how we could cash a check for more than an item’s purchase price, and then he gave us an ultimatum: either stop writing all these small checks or find another bank. Katja changed her check-writing practices. An impartial observer might say that that marked the end of frugality in our married life.

My parents came down to visit in the spring at the time of the Ann Arbor Art Fair. We all went together. Katja saw a painting that she fell in love with. I remember it as being very large and very colorful. The price tag was $700. Katja wanted it with all her being. In fact, she asked my parents if they would lend us the money. She said she couldn’t go on living without it, and I think she meant it. My mother, a fledgling mother-in-law at that time, was horrified. She told me privately that Katja’s unchecked desire for luxury didn’t bode well. I was a little nervous myself, but I told her how remarkably frugal Katja was. My mother wasn’t convinced. Little did I know.

The academic year came to an end. Katja was committed to traveling, and she chose the Seattle World’s Fair in Seattle as our first destination. She had saved a few dollars each week from her Faber’s Fabric paycheck, and so we had $200 (plus my father’s Standard Oil gasoline credit card) to cover a six-week trip to the West Coast. We set out from Menominee in July. I’ll have to tell you more about that another time, but I’ll just say for now that this was a momentous time in our lives.

Love,

Dave

G-Mail Comments

-Linda C (9-3): The bank story is just great. And your dog story is soooo sad I will call u soon. Great updates on the twins. What is too late to call?

-Vicki L (9-2): Dear David, Whenever I hear of your days in Ann Arbor, I wish we'd been there together for a longer period of time (it must only have been one year). I'll always think of Katja at Faber's. I knew nothing about going to football games - just think, you could've introduced me and my whole life might've turned out differently (eg. I may've become a cheerleader instead of a hippie). By the way, I refuse to believe the man in the picture is actually you - it's clearly Katja but as far as I'm concerned she's standing with a young Ralph Buscher. Love, Sis

-Donna D (9-1): david, this is great! can you make the picture bigger? it is awfully hard to see. but it could just be my eyes,,,,:) donna

-David to Donna (9-2): Hi Donna: I agree the pic would be better larger, but I was unable to do so. David