2 People, 4 states, 75 Years
Saturday, February 20, 2010
By Amanda Robbins - Reprinted from the Albany Democrat-Herald

With their 75th wedding anniversary coming up on Tuesday, Feb. 23, Don and Fern Persons of Lebanon apparently know the secret to a long marriage.

“Never go to bed mad,” Fern said.

She moved from Glasgow, Montana, to Mankato, Minnesota, in 1935 when she was 17, following the deaths of her parents. That’s where she met Don, then 21, and they married the same year. Fern was 17 and Don was 22.

They rented a small house on Woodland Avenue, and Dave said he bought the lot across the street on a “handshake” and used a horse and plow to excavate the foundation area for their house.

“I would come home from construction and carpet laying and dig the hole,” Don said.

The Person’s family including his four children lived in the garage and basement until Don was able to finish the rest of the house.

Eventually the family moved to Arizona because they were tired of the cold Minnesota winters. But they found the Arizona summers to warm and moved again, this time to Newport Beach, California, in 1958.

“It was like a new country to us,” said Rebecca Nelson, one of the Persons’ daughters. “Dad would come home after work and go swimming in the ocean.”

In California, Don worked for Carlson Linoleum until 1970 and Fern worked as a secretary for Martin Aviation at the John Wayne Airport.  “I even met John Wayne, who had a place at the airport,” Fern said.

Don started to feel crowded as the area’s population – and traffic – grew, so one more time the family decided to move, this time to Oregon, in 1975.

They rented a house in Lebanon and later bought a house on Cleveland Street. The family started attending Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in 1970 and still does. Don was handyman there and got involved in a lot of the building projects.

Fern was a volunteer at the Lebanon hospital from 1974 to 2002. She said she was “volunteer of the year” once and got to be in the Strawberry Festival.  “I really miss those days of helping people,” she said.

Judy Nelson, one of the Person’s daughter said people really loved her mother’s warm personality:  “My mom’s whole life was doing for others, and she did a great job of that.”

Now Don, 96, and Fern 92, live at The Oaks Retirement and Assisted Living. They have many friends and are active in The Oak’s community.

In addition to Nelson, the Person’s children are Chet of Steamboat Springs, Colorado; Judy of southern California; Becky of Albany; Ric of Lebanon and Mark of Waterloo.  They have nine grandchildren, 11 great-grandchildren and 10 great-great-grandchildren.

The couple celebrated the momentous occasion with a reception at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church last week.

Lebanon Celebrates 100th Strawberry Festival
The Oaks participates in parade with float recognizing resident centenarians

Lebanon Oregon has an annual Strawberry Festival, this year was the 100th annual so the theme was "100 years of strawberries".

The Oaks has four residents who are one hundred or over, so we decided to have a "birthday cake" with portraits of each of our centurians on it.  The cake was four layers and the third layer had one portrait on each side.  The decor was strawberrries.  The banners on the sides said "The Oaks at Lebanon Celebrating 100 Berry Good Years."

Riding on the float was the administrator and two residents wearing clothing and hats in the style from 100 years ago.  We had antique quilts covering the chairs and recorded music from a gramaphone playing.