On Saturday, November 1, the Romeo Community Archives will host another a Scanning Party at the Romeo District Library Kezar Branch from 11am to 1:30pm. For those who don't know, these events involve people receiving high-quality scans of their photographs to ensure long-term preservation. In our case, patrons even had a chance to donate their digital copies to the archives if they wanted to. One person Charlotte Grobbel did just that by giving copies of family pictures throughout the years to our digital collection. I've talked about one of them before, so here's another one.
This is of Charlotte's parents Dorothy and Frank Murphy on their wedding day on January 3, 1942 in Romeo. According to Charlotte, they got married at the St. Clement Catholic Church when it was still on Fremont Street. It would be another decade for the parish to be at its current location on South Main Street. The building on the former street is now the Grace Baptist Church.
Charlotte didn't have much else to say about her parents' wedding, but The Romeo Observer Press did on the front page of the January 9, 1942 issue. In it, the article mentions that the nuptials took place at 9am on January 3, and it was read by Reverend Mark Hoskins. We also know that the church was decorated with poinsettas and Christmas greens. This makes sense since the wedding occurred right after Christmas and New Year's Day.
Like a lot of wedding posts I've done before, the article goes into a lot of detail about the bride's wedding dress. Specifically, it states, "White grosgrain taffeta fashioned the bride's gown which had a sweetheart neckline and a full skirt extending into a long train. Her fingertip veil of white tulle fell from a tiara of seed pearls and orange blossoms."
The article doesn't skip on the bouquet as it says that it was made up of white roses, garza chrysanthemums, and stevia. It's a good thing that Charlotte donated a digital copy of this photo, so we can see her mother's wedding dress and flowers for ourselves, and they look gorgeous.
Also from that article, it details the dresses of Betty Casey, the maid of honor, as well as Laura Havers and Marie Murphy - the couple's mothers. In addition, the best man was Frank's cousin Bernard Diedrich. The wedding reception was at the home of Frank's parents with 60 guests. I hope the house was big enough to fit all of them in, especially in the winter.
Six months later, Frank enlisted in the US Coast Guard in the wake of the United States joining World War II. He would remained there until 1945. Even though they look quite reserved in their wedding photo, Frank and Dorothy Murphy would go on to have six children, including Charlotte, and were happily married until his death in 1998.
People can view this picture and others on our online catalog at https://rcarchives.pastperfectonline.com/
See you next Saturday!
To learn more about the Havers and Murphy families as well as the Scanning Party, you can contact the Romeo Community Archives at rca@romemodistrictlibrary.org or call (586) 690-4890.
Images and sources courtesy of the Romeo Community Archives; Romeo Community Archives, Digital Collection; Charlotte Grobbel; Ancestry; and The Romeo Observer Press, January 9, 1942, p.1
