Wedding picture of Mary Emaline Hill and Sam Houston Denning, my great-grandparents. They were married December 2, 1884 in Jack County, Texas. Mr. and Mrs. Denning were the parents of thirteen children, nine boys and four girls, all of whom lived well into their eighties.
Wasn’t the Royal Wedding absolutely smashing? I especially loved the wedding gown with lace handmade in the traditional manner. I mused over the fact that Kate’s wedding was so different and yet so much like weddings on the American frontier.
Until the 20th century, most weddings, like funerals, were held in the home of the bride’s parents or in the home of the justice of the peace. Wedding gowns were seldom white; few women wore white since it was so difficult to keep clean. Kate’s bouquet was reminiscent of 19th century ones. She carried a sprig from the same plant that Queen Victoria did.
One of my friends tells of her grandmother helping a friend prepare for her nuptials at the turn of the 20th century. My friend’s grandmother enthusiastically gathered honeysuckle, ivy, and another trailing vine from the garden and arranged them on the mantle the morning of the wedding. When the time came for the bride and her attendants to appear, my friend’s grandmother had a severe, itchy rash. Needless to say, that lovely vine was poison ivy.
The Blackland Prairie here in Texas turns into a quagmire in rainy weather. The rains came with a vengeance one wedding day. It was impossible for the minister to come from town to perform the ceremony. Who could possibly marry them? One of the guest mentioned that a minister was staying down the road with a family. He was sent for and the ceremony began. However, this minister had only one sermon in his repertoire; a hell fire and damnation oratory that lasted over an hour. Finally, he pronounced the words everyone wanted to hear, “By the power vested in me by the State of Texas I now pronounce you man and wife.”
While William had difficulty putting the ring on Kate’s finger, no one had poison ivy that we know of and the sermon was quite lovely, didn’t you think?