Getting Hitched ~ Funny Story of a Wedding Journey in 1918 with Pictures

An amusing tale...

The "Gettin' Hitched" meaning in this story refers to Holy Matrimony and the marriage of my husband's maternal grandparents. But horses and buggies also play a vital part in this hand-written rendition of their wedding journey and the problems that they encountered with their "Old Henry Ford" also referred to in those days of 1918 as "Tin Lizzies."

Recently I have been going through some collections of old photographs and other memorabilia that have been saved throughout the years dating back several generations.

In so doing, I have run across some wonderful and heartwarming discoveries.

Eventually my goal is to have almost everything put into photo albums or scrapbooks with names and places (if known) and some sense of order as to dates and times.

Let this story begin...

Our Wedding Book...

This delightful discovery although not in the best of shape was none-the-less fun to see and read.

Notations were made inside this little booklet of the date and location of my husband's grandparent's wedding as well as who officiated and who witnessed the event.

They were united in Holy Matrimony in Oskaloosa, Iowa in the year 1918.

Most of the pages inside the covers of this booklet were left blank.

Not filled in were categories such as the following:

Guests

Announcement Cards

Newspaper Clippings and Cards

At Home

Wedding Cards

Photographs

and

Gifts

Fortunately for us, the part about "Our Wedding Journey" was filled in and I'll simply let the tale begin as it was hand written those many years ago.

Our Wedding Journey

"Leaving Lynnville at 8 O'Clock we proceeded on our way to the house of C.H. Merediths.

Arriving there we left our car and in company with Nellis and Clifford we started on our journey to Oskaloosa.

Everything went well until we reached the first big hill.

This half Old Henry Ford absolutely refused to climb without the aid of some heavy pushing.

After an hour of pushing, puffing, and sweating we finally made the hill.

We all piled in and once more started on our journey.

After driving about one mile and a half we came to a hill that was so very muddy that it was impossible to climb it.

While the boys went for a team the girls walked into Taintor.

The boys finally succeeded in getting the car out with the aid of a team. Reaching Taintor just at dark once more we loaded in the Ladies.

After talking over our troubles and tribulations and since the roads were so very bad we decided to make a desperate effort to catch the train at New Sharon bound for Oskaloosa.

On reaching New Sharon our hearts sank within us just as we reached the depot we saw the tail end of the train leaving.

After having another talk we started on our journey once more.

As it was freezing we made our way to Oskaloosa without further mishap.

At nine O'clock the knot was tied then followed dinner given by our Aunt.

After 11 O'clock we started on our homeward journey.

It was very rough but we made it safely reaching the home of Clifford Merediths about one O'clock where we stayed until the next afternoon.

Then we started home in our car about 1/2 mile from their place.

We had a blow out.

Clifford and Nellis came along in a buggy.

Clifford and the bride changed places. The girls going on in the buggy.

The boys finally got the car fixed and started.

All went well until close to Bartows where they got stuck in the mud.

The team and wagon were close at hand so it didn't take very long to get started again.

This being the last of our mishaps we arrived safely in Sully to our new home."

Early cars verses horses and buggies...

Henry Ford engineered many of the early cars called Model T's and made them so affordable that many people who used to rely upon horses and buggies as their mode of transportation started choosing the "horseless carriages" to transport them from place to place.

However the roads were not like the highways of today. Often they would have been dirt paths (especially in the country or rural areas) and if it rained, muddy ruts in the road made it hard for those cars to navigate.

Also the early cars did not have the horsepower of cars today.

Thus the hills became obstacles in which oftentimes the people would have to get out of the vehicle and help push it up the hill as in this true story of my husband's relative's wedding journey.

This was definitely a time of transition!

By now you know that "Gettin' Hitched" was a slang expression for getting married. Also getting the horses hitched up to carriages was commonplace back in the days of when this marriage of my husband's grandparents took place in 1918. Hopefully this little story of their mishaps on their wedding journey will bring a smile to your face as it did ours when we recently re-discovered it.