Longevity - Week 3 #52Ancestors

As a child from a split home, I have the great blessing of having twice the grandparents, twice the love, and twice the ancestors' stories to tell.

Thus Marion and Erma Bennett Winn are the subjects of my week 3 post for #52Ancestors.  As soon as I heard the topic of the week I immediately thought of my great grandparents, on my step-dad's side, affectionately known as Grandma & Grandpa Great!

Marion and Erma were both raised in Idaho, born in the early 1900's, then married in 1924.  They became my Grandma and Grandpa Great in 1985 when my parents married that July.  The Winn family was fast to embrace my sister and me as their own, which is a tribute to their wonderful legacy of love and support.  Fast forward to the turn of the century when Allstate Insurance Company reached out to this now aged couple.  The company had performed what they called a nationwide search for the "longest married couple in the United States", and had found Marion and Erma to be just that.  What followed was a series of honors and recognition for their long lasting marriage and commitment to each other.  Allstate used them for a nationwide campaign that they ran: "Marion and Erma Bennett Winn. Longest married couple in the United States. After 77 years, 7 children, 14 grandchildren and 40 great grandchildren, they've ended up in a good place. THE RIGHT HANDS MAKE ALL THE DIFFERENCE".

Following that honor, the couple was awarded the Gold Medal Marriage Award by Governor Leavitt and his wife, of the state of Utah at the Governor's Annual Marriage Conference.  In 2002 the Winns had the great privilege of lighting the torch at the Winter Olympics, which were hosted by their home state of Utah that year.  During the Olympics the Governor also invited them to meet President George W. Bush and his wife upon their brief visit to the state, which was quite the honor for this now popular duo.

My favorite quote I've stumbled upon in my digging is from Grandpa during that time.  He said, "I can get along with her a lot better than I can get along without her."  A sweet and perfect tribute to his sweet wife.

Later that year grandpa passed away and grandma followed less than a year later.  I love that they received so many honors and tributes during those last few years honoring the longevity of a marriage that surely had it's share of ups and downs, but had withstood the test of time.  A long marriage is a wonderful tribute to their legacy and I'm so grateful to have such a wonderful heritage to both honor, remember and hopefully replicate.

Here's a couple links to articles I found about them, I'll add other links and images as I find them:
https://ldsmag.com/article-1-5002/
http://familylifeeducation.org/brent_barlow.pdf



To my Winn family:
Please add comments of memories about Grandpa and Grandma Great below and or share any images you have of them so we can collect them all into an album. Let's preserve their legacy together.
My email is: LivsTreeHouse@gmail.com