It's always been frightfully easy for Oscar and Mary Strunk to remember their wedding anniversary.
It falls on Halloween.
The Richland couple celebrate their 65th anniversary today with dinner at Old Country Buffet with their family.
But they weren't planning a Halloween wedding back in 1944.
"That was not our intention," said Mary, 84.
The couple originally planned to wed Oct. 30, while Oscar was on leave from the Navy, but blood test results required for their marriage license were delayed, forcing them to wait another day.
The secret to their strong union?
"Trust," Oscar, 85, exclaimed. "Trust, and never go to sleep mad."
"There's been a lot of give and take" in the relationship, Mary said.
When the couple first met in Marion, Ill., Mary was 16 years old, "just a child," she said, but Oscar quickly won her over.
A coal miner before enlisting, Oscar got permission to date Mary for being "such a good kid."
"He would drive our mothers to church," she recalled.
The couple dated for a year before Oscar left with the Navy, serving two years before coming back to Illinois and marrying Mary.
When he was discharged in 1950 after serving for seven years in the Navy, they moved to Richland. Oscar worked at Hanford for more than 37 years before retiring from Westinghouse Hanford Co. in 1987.
The couple have lived in the same house on Douglas Court for 59 years.
Their daughters, Barbara Krueger of Spokane and Brigit Strunk of Benton City, view their parents as an inspiration. Brenda Klucas, the second of their three daughters, died of cancer 15 years ago. She would have been 60 on Oct. 28.
The couple have eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
Strunk, who is engaged, said she plans to get married next Halloween in honor of her parents.
"They're still happily married and still going strong," she said. "This is kind of a little tribute to them."
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