Happy Memories
JEFFERSON TWP — Before the days of cell phones or the Internet, sometimes you had to drive from Iowa to Pennsylvania to woo the love of your life.
Irvin Hanson, 93, who lives at the Concordia Lutheran Ministries' assisted living facility in Jefferson Township, still remembers when he had to borrow his father's car in the early 1950s to drive to see his soon-to-be wife in Western Pennsylvania.
Hanson, when he was about 30 years old, worked on a farm with his father in Iowa. But when he wasn't working, he enjoyed going to dances, attending two or three of them every week, he said.
One night, he went to a dance at the Bohemian Hall, a popular dance hall near Fort Dodge that burned down in 2012.
That is when he met Eleanor.
“I danced with this one girl all evening, but she said she was from Pennsylvania,” Hanson said.
Since Eleanor was only visiting her family in Iowa, Hanson told her that she should take good care of her boyfriend when she arrived back home.
Hanson still recalls his response to Eleanor after she told him she did not have a boyfriend.
“I told her I would see her in Pennsylvania then,” he said.
He wasn't joking.
Soon after that first dance, Hanson tracked down Eleanor's cousin at another dance in Iowa, and he left with Eleanor's address.
Since Hanson did not have his own car, he took his father's car and headed to Wexford.
When he finally found the right house, Hanson said he stayed in the area.
“I got a place to stay,” he said, and that was that.
In 1956, the two were married.
Hanson described Eleanor as a beautiful and even-tempered person — and the love of his life.
However, in 1978, a family vacation ended with bad news: Eleanor had inoperable liver cancer.
“I'll never forget. We had been on vacation, but she wasn't feeling well,” Hanson said. “She should not have gone (on vacation), but she didn't want to hold us back so she went along on vacation with us.
“I was getting very worried about her, and the doctor called me ... said your wife has inoperable liver cancer. And that really floored me.”
Hanson remembers that Eleanor knew her time was limited, and she only lived for about three more months.
“We were all at her bedside when she passed on,” Hanson said, including himself and their five children. “She told the kids to take care of dad.”
For Hanson, Eleanor's death was an emotional struggle, but he was tight-lipped about just how tough it was.It took him nearly a year to come to terms with her death, he said.In 1985, Hanson married Jennett, a woman he met at St. John's Lutheran Church of Highland.While Jennett also taught Sunday school, she was horribly hot-headed, Hanson said.“I wasn't worried that anything would happen to Jennett,” he said.Hanson remembers that it was daylight when he was driving his pickup truck, taking a load of lumber from Warrendale to Saxonburg. Jennett was in the car and the roads were particularly icy one day in 1993.“We hit a tree at the bottom of the hill, crashed right into it,” he said. “The windshield just went to pieces all onto our feet and she just sat there.”Hanson said Jennett was still breathing but was obviously injured.“She did not have her seat belt on, and I didn't tell her to put one on,” he said, stressing that he was not often in the business of telling Jennett what to do.“She had a brand new coat, and I didn't think she'd want to have those dirty old seat belts on her coat.”Hanson said his seat belt is the only reason he lived.At Jennett's funeral, Hanson remembers telling someone that he didn't know if he would ever be happy again.Again, Hanson went through the grieving process, which still lasted about a year, he said.He said he doesn't believe losing two wives has closed him off to love, but he did stress that he “didn't commit (himself) to anyone else.”To this day, Hanson doesn't know how his experiences have changed him, but he also said he hasn't felt particularly lonely.But he definitely hasn't forgotten Eleanor.“Eleanor was the love of my life,” he said.
