75th ANNIVERSARY

Kenny and Ruth Draper: June 2, 1948

DRAPER’S PAPER ROUTE

75th ANNIVERSARY

by Adam Carroll Draper

Kenny first saw her in a roller-skating rink just after the war.  A sailor saw her, too, which presented a problem because they both asked her to skate.  Of course, this amused Ruth.  She noticed Kenny right off, skating up to her all smooth in his new skates, sporting his initials on the side.  But there was the issue with the sailor, and with a wry Irish smile, she enjoyed the attention while she sized them up.  The sailor didn’t stand a chance. 

“Flip you,” said Kenny, producing a quarter and tossing it in the air quickly.

“Tails,” said the hapless sailor.  And it was tails.

“Heads,” Kenny announced as he put the coin in his pocket and skated off with the belle of the ball (or skating-rink).

What are you going to do?  Smooth.   Ruth liked him.

They started talking about getting married on their second date.  That’s what you did in DC after the war, right?  There is a reason why the generation of triumph produced so many children of the generation of ingrates and dilettantes.  But what was to question?  They were both from Oklahoma, sort of.  Kenny’s family (his mom, dad, two brothers and he) had moved to California during the dust bowl, when he was twelve.   Ruth did take issue with Kenny’s last name, Draper.  That was English.  As an O’Rourke, it was her Irish duty to tell him (on their second date – since they were discussing marriage) that 800 years was quite long enough and that his people needed to get off her island.  Kenny listened attentively.  She was beautiful.  He could have cared less about England in that moment, although he did deflect her tirade upon the House of Orange when he asked if she knew what that was.

There was a bit of a snag in the marriage plan.  She had to get permission from her mom.  As the Beatles later sang, “She was just seventeen. You know what I mean.”  Ruth Anne O’Rourke had graduated as President of her Senior Class from St. Scholastica, a boarding school in Ft. Smith, Arkansas, at sixteen years of age and immediately thereafter had gone to work for J. Edgar Hoover as a teletype operator for the FBI.  [Today, that would violate section 823.029346 of the Seize Kids for Foster Care regulation of the We Need Them for Funding Agency.]   Ruth and her twin sister, Rose, were the only girls of nine children Belva O’Rourke raised by herself during The Great Depression, working for 65 cents an hour at the Post Office in downtown Tulsa.  Ruth’s dad had died in a tragic accident when she was three.  At first, Belva would not hear of the marriage thing, but Irish priests can be persuasive.  Kenny and Ruth convinced their priest, Father O’Brien, that they were serious, and his powerful reasoning about the nature of youth and such things had swayed Belva’s favor.

James Kenneth Draper was a man of the world at nineteen, of course.  Remember, he was a soldier and all.  They had this.  She would keep working for Mr. Hoover.  When he got out of the army, he would work three jobs and go to George Washington University on the G.I. Bill to study Physical Chemistry.  (Well, that may not have been the plan right then, but it ended up that way).  Kenny was a smarty pants!  Hell, they were both smart.  Ruth skipped two years of school to graduate at 16 years old.  That was that.  Marriage was the next step, so they did.  And that was how these two, smart, industrious, young, naïve Okies in love met Father O’Brien (with his two cocker spaniels) in a little chapel in a basement on June 2, 1948 and declared their eternal devotion to each other.   

This is the story of how my favorite people in the world got married SEVENTY-FIVE years ago.  They had some kids (of which I am one) and a bunch of grandkids, but we are decidedly not the story.  They are adventurers and we are celebrating their adventure the way they want with a few family members getting together at their house in Mountainburg, Arkansas.  I suspect that Mom will have a whiskey sour and Dad a glass of scotch.  We will have fun and then they will tell us to enjoy ourselves elsewhere because they have work to do. 

I will add that my dad is the smartest person I have ever met.  No, I have known a lot of very smart people.  My dad is a genius.  He is also as unpretentious as the day is long, but it only takes about two minutes in any conversation before you realize that there a whole universe of brilliant observation stored behind those shining eyes.  My mom is still the belle of the ball - and so witty that she’ll shut down a room of socialists faster than you can say, “Margaret Thatcher.”  She sees right down to the nub of someone’s character, but a stranger would rarely know it.  They are both funny and friendly, and two of the most giving, hard working people I have ever met.  Let me say “hard working” again!  While I am in town, Dad is sure to put me to work on whatever project he is working on (like last year when he and I cut down a tree). 

I simply adore my parents. 

So, Mom and Dad, this is just a little story to celebrate your 75th anniversary.  I love you, and I loved writing this for you, particularly the ending, which everybody knows:

And they lived happily ever after!