Saturday afternoon has rolled around once again and Randy Seaver has posted this week’s challenge for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun.

1)  One of our family stories for our descendants should be how we met our spouse.  Another one should be, if we know it, how did our parents meet each other?

2)  This week, let’s tell our “parents meeting” story if we know it.  If you don’t know that story, tell us another one about one of your relatives meeting their spouse or significant other.

George Sabo and Doris Adams, c1946

I have to say right upfront that I don’t know how or where my parents met. However, I do know a few details to narrow the time frame.

My mother, Doris Priscilla Adams, was a WAVE in the U.S. Navy and stationed in San Diego, California until she was discharged in March 1946. She returned home to live with my grandparents and aunts in Ridgewood, Bergen, New Jersey.

My father, George Michael Sabo, lived at 49 Summer Street, Passaic, Passaic, New Jersey at the time.

Passaic and Ridgewood are only about ten miles apart, but that is a lot of space to try to determine where they met. Both loved to dance and I wouldn’t be surprised if they met at a local dance.

When I was about nine or ten years old, I was in the basement of our house on Summer Street, helping my grandmother clean. There was a portable little closet and I found some papers on the shelf. One was a newspaper clipping of a woman and I asked Nana who she was.

Apparently, my father was engaged to another young lady until he met my mother and broke off the engagement.  I think I sensed that it wouldn’t be a good subject to bring up with my parents and the matter was dropped. That paper is long gone, probably left behind when we moved to Wayne several years later.

My parents also had a relatively short courtship as they couldn’t have met before March 1946 and were married at City Hall on 6 June 1947 in Hackensack, New Jersey.

I also think they eloped, although both were of legal age, because my grandmother was a devout Catholic (my dad not so much!) and my mother’s family, being long time New Englanders, had belonged to the Congregational Church for at least a century.

George and Doris Sabo, Montreal, Canada

Although their wedding was a small civil ceremony, they did visit Montreal, Canada on their honeymoon.

The only person who might be able to tell me how my parents met would be my aunt. However, she was quite young at the time and might not remember. I guess I need to put that on my to-do list. 🙂

Thank you, Randy, for this week’s challenge.