Current:Home > Contact2 teens who dated in the 1950s lost touch. They reignited their romance 63 years later. -GlobalInvest
2 teens who dated in the 1950s lost touch. They reignited their romance 63 years later.
View
Date:2025-04-21 23:45:08
Two teenagers who were high school sweethearts in the 1950s broke up after a few years and didn't see each other until a little over a year ago. Now, Caroline Reeves and Eddie Lamm are newlyweds — sharing a love that is blossoming 63 years after they first met.
"We feel young again," said Reeves, who turns 82 on Thursday.
"When you're in your 80s, you don't have to grow old," she said. "We keep our minds going and we're active and we have fun and laugh and tease and cut up and just want to just live as long — the best life we can live."
Back in 1956, Elvis was on the jukebox and President Dwight D. Eisenhower was in the White House — while Reeves and Lamm were in love.
"Once I saw her, it was all over," said Lamm, who is now 85.
Reeves thought he was the cutest boy on campus.
The only meal he ever bought her back then was french fries and Coke — but it wasn't a fancy dinner she was looking for. She had her eyes on a high school class ring and all that it would signify.
"It was an engagement ring," she said. "And I was the type of person that would have committed myself to him for the rest of my life with that ring."
But she didn't get the ring — at least not then.
Lamm had set his sights high, joining ROTC at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville with dreams of flying planes in the U.S. Air Force. It was Reeves' senior year in high school and he couldn't find the words to say a proper goodbye, so he didn't.
"We pulled up in her driveway and I said,' May I kiss you?' And so I kissed her, goodnight, then, not knowing that that's the last time I would kiss her in 64 or 65 years."
Reeves said he didn't follow up with, "Could I take you out? Could we go to a movie? Can I see you again before I leave?"
"I opened that car door and I got out of that car and ran up the steps and slammed the door and went upstairs and cried all night," she said. "That was it."
Their lives then followed far different paths. She became Miss Nashville 1959. Two years later, in 1961, they got married to other people. Reeves married Charles Wallace and Lamm married Polly Piper.
Lamm went on to serve 21 years flying KC-135s in the U.S. Air Force. Reeves traveled the world, was an interior designer, has been a magazine writer and wrote three novels.
In December of 2021, Lamm's wife, Polly, the mother of their two sons, died from ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease. They'd been married two days shy of 60 years, and in Polly's final years, Lamm was her caretaker.
"It just shows you his strength and how sweet and kind and gentle this man is and always has been," Reeves said.
After Reeves' marriage to Wallace ended in the 1980s, she married a man named George Kennedy, who died in 2001.
Reeves said she wondered "all the time" over the course of her life how Lamm was, and Lamm said he wondered, too, how Reeves was doing.
In April 2022, Lamm was living in California and Reeves was in Nashville.
"All at once something hits me. I said, 'I've got to call her,'" Lamm said.
He tried nine times before finally reaching her.
"After the second day, it was comfortable. It was natural. By the third day, that third night, he told me he still loved me. And I knew my life had changed. And then the next morning, he calls and he says, 'I apologize for being so forward last night.'"
But his confession of love was what Reeves wanted to hear, and he flew to Nashville to see her.
This time, she was in the driver's seat. When she went to pick him up, they didn't get too far from the airport — at first.
"He peeked his head into my car and I just — he took my breath away," Reeves said. "I've never seen anything like it in my entire life. I just can't even explain it. So I got out of the parking lot, zoom, zoom, zoom, went around and found the FedEx parking lot. And it was the warehouse. It was closed at night and they had all these security lights. And I got out and jumped around and we hugged and kissed ... and I remember looking up at the security lights and insects were swirling all around."
"So, FedEx does deliver," she said, to a burst of laughter.
After Lamm arrived in Nashville, he waited five days before asking her to move with him to California. Three months later, at the age of 84, he popped the question.
He had planned to give her his mother's ring, but Reeves said it was too precious and should be saved for one of his grandchildren. Instead, she wanted his high school class ring, and he put it on her finger.
She called it "miraculous" that they found their love again.
"And we asked God all the time, 'why did you do this?' And now we know: to take care of each other," she said.
veryGood! (51)
Related
- All That You Wanted to Know About She’s All That
- Russian missiles target Ukrainian cities of Kyiv and Kharkiv, killing at least 3 people
- When does 'Queer Eye' start? Season 8 premiere date, cast, how to watch and stream
- Kourtney Kardashian Shares Penelope Disick's Sweet Gesture to Baby Rocky
- A White House order claims to end 'censorship.' What does that mean?
- Another Boeing 737 jet needs door plug inspections, FAA says
- Botched Star Dr. Terry Dubrow Reveals Why He Stopped Taking Ozempic
- This magnet heart nail hack is perfect for Valentine's Day – if you can pull it off
- DeepSeek: Did a little known Chinese startup cause a 'Sputnik moment' for AI?
- Saturday's Texans vs. Ravens playoff game was ESPN's most-watched NFL game of all time
Ranking
- Opinion: Gianni Infantino, FIFA sell souls and 2034 World Cup for Saudi Arabia's billions
- Ohio board stands by disqualification of transgender candidate, despite others being allowed to run
- Man charged with killing his wife in 1991 in Virginia brought back to US to face charges
- Judge orders the unsealing of divorce case of Trump special prosecutor in Georgia accused of affair
- San Francisco names street for Associated Press photographer who captured the iconic Iwo Jima photo
- Bear rescued from bombed-out Ukrainian zoo gets new home in Scotland
- How Allison Holker and Her Kids Found New Purpose One Year After Stephen tWitch Boss' Death
- Saudi Arabia hears dozens of countries critique its human rights record at the UN in Geneva
Recommendation
Can Bill Belichick turn North Carolina into a winner? At 72, he's chasing one last high
Detroit Lions no longer a cute story. They're now a win away from Super Bowl
Emma Stone and director Yorgos Lanthimos on Poor Things
Here's how to avoid malware, safely charge your phone in public while traveling
Angelina Jolie nearly fainted making Maria Callas movie: 'My body wasn’t strong enough'
Live updates | Palestinians flee heavy fighting in southern Gaza as US and UK bomb Yemen again
The Razzie nominations are out. Here's who's up for worst actor and actress.
Shirtless Jason Kelce loses his mind celebrating Travis Kelce touchdown at Bills game