Don and Kookie met in Kookie’s sophomore year of high school (Don was a jr.) and they were the very best of friends.
They had their first date about a year later on Halloween (maybe that’s why they both loved that holiday so much).
Don graduated one year before Kookie and during the summer entered the A F, training at Lackland AFB in San Antonio. After basic and a leave he was sent to Indiana University to study the Russian arts, life, and became a linguist. Kookie did not see Don for 10 months while he was at Bloomington, Indiana. However, they always knew they were going to be married.
Don wrote many letters and when he saved up enough to call Kookie he would. Of course they weren’t very long conversations! So, through correspondence with his parents (they didn’t have a phone) he got them to give permission for a legal document which they signed in order for Kookie to go to the court house and get the license. Since Kookie was under aged, she and her mother went and got it. Don arrived home by bus from Indiana at 5:30 PM on August 6, 1960 and by 7:30 PM they were having a church wedding at the Belcher Baptist Church, Belcher, LA.
Kookie’s best friend was her maid of honor; Don’s brother, Jesse, was his best man and Kookie’s sisters, Judy and Kitty were the candle lighters. They were married 33 years at the time of Don’s death.
