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| Couple celebrates 80 years of marriage |
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| People - Anniversaries | |||
| Wednesday, 28 January 2009 09:00 | |||
 Verbal Isenhower can remember the first time she kissed her husband, Vern.“Our parents didn’t know this, but another girl and I would go pick apples on Sunday afternoons on the farm, and we’d sneak back a little farther and meet Vern and another boy. Before I kissed him, I watched what the other girl did, and I decided I could do that, too,” Verbal said, chuckling and reenacting a lovers’ clinch. The recollection was just one of the amusing anecdotes the Isenhowers shared with dozens of family, friends and congregation members who gathered to celebrate the couple’s 80th wedding anniversary Sunday afternoon in the fellowship hall of First Baptist Church, 406 S. Vine St. The spacious basement room was packed with well-wishers who lined up to greet the couple and reminisce. Then nervous teenagers, the Isenhowers tied the knot Jan. 27, 1929, and moved into a small, three-room farmhouse near Salem, Ark. The couple’s devotion to each other remained strong during the long Great Depression that followed on the heals of their nuptials. In an earlier interview, Verbal said close family ties are what kept their marriage strong during the depression. “I don’t think people are as close to their families now as they used to be, and I think that’s too bad,” she said. “I think family is important, and we’ve been very fortunate that our kids still live in this area.” The Isenhowers’ children and their families were among the celebrants at the church, where state Sen. Pat Apple presented the couple with a senatorial plaque, recognizing the significance of the couple’s 80-year bond. The Isenhowers have three daughters, Shirley, Sue and Betty, and a son, Bill. Their oldest son, Herbert, died a few years ago after retiring from the Green Berets.  The Isenhowers, who are both in their late 90s, moved to Louisburg after World War II. They’ve lived in the community for 62 years, where Vern broke horses for a living well into his 90s before retiring at the age of 95. He has bought and sold more than 1,500 horses in his lifetime.Vern still grows vegetables, and has been a regular fixture at the Louisburg Farmers Market every season. Vendors from the market were among the festive crowd members who watched Vern and Verbal feed each other wedding cake and raise their punch-filled, long-stem glasses in a silent toast to each other. When asked if she enjoyed that first kiss they shared on a Sunday afternoon all those decades ago, Verbal’s eyes sparkled. “Oh, yes. I loved it.”
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