Hitting a High Note
Knoch High School graduate Eddie Stockert put on the performance of his life at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville last month although he didn't play a note.
His girlfriend Megan Wheeland of Williamsport will never forget the moment.
As Wheeland and Stockert are both country music fans, it was to be expected that when they found themselves in Nashville for a relative's wedding that they'd take a tour of the Grand Ole Opry.
What wasn't expected was that Stockert would propose to Megan on the stage of the Opry, taking her and the venue's employees by surprise.
Stockert, the son of Jodi and Ken Stockert of Cabot, graduated from Knoch High School in 2012 and then from Mansfield University in 2016.
He met Wheeland at the university.
“We met at orientation before our freshman year,” Stockert said. She was wearing Daisy Dukes and cowboy boots and I fell in love at first sight.”
Wheeland concurred, saying “there was an instant attraction.”
One of things they had in common was a taste for and appreciation of country music.
“She grew up on a farm and grew up on country music, but never went to concerts. I went to concerts,” Stockert said.
However even a shared appreciation of a steel guitar couldn't keep the two together. After about 18 months, the couple broke up.
“Life just got busy,” Wheeland said. “We decided to experience college on our own.”
“We went our separate ways,” he said. “We were split up for three years. I thought of her as the one that got away.”
Wheeland graduated in 2016 and got a job in her hometown of Williamsport doing finance, public relations and marketing for the Christian Church of Cogan Station.
Stockert graduated in 2017 and moved to Kane to pursue his career in fisheries biology.
But about a year ago, they reconnected.
Wheeland recalled, “It was through a text. When we dated, he had given me a bow and arrow. I found it and wanted to know if he wanted it back.”
An exchange of texts led to a long-distance relationship of weekend visits between Kane and Williamsport.
In December, while in Nashville attending a family wedding, Stockert made plans to take Wheeland on a tour of the Grand Ole Opry.
But he had laid other plans well in advance, first asking Megan's father for permission to propose to his daughter and getting her mother's engagement ring and having its diamonds reset in a new white gold band.
While on the tour, Stockert had secretly handed his phone to another person on the tour and asked him to please take pictures, and when they arrived on the stage he got down on one knee and asked Megan to marry him.However, he did not make any plans ahead of time with the Opry management.“My knees were shaking. It was me and her and 15 other people,” he said. “We were actually on the part of the stage where there is a circle that's a piece of stage from the Ryman Theater (the most famous previous home of the Grand Ole Opry).“They call it the ring of honor. Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Hank Williams have all stood on it,” he said. “She told me we should get in a picture in the inner circle. When we did, I got down on one knee and asked 'Will you marry me?'”While she said yes, Stockert said “She cried for 15 to 20 minutes.”“I cried for two hours straight,”countered Wheeland, “But only after first saying yes.”The tour guide and staff at the Opry were so surprised with the proposal that at the end of the tour they asked the couple not to leave and took them back to a private room where they had one of their professional photographers take pictures of them.“All the dressing rooms have themes. They took us to the 'It Takes Two' room which is used by duets like Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood,” Wheeland said.Stockert said the tour guide was also a photographer and got pictures of them in the dressing room.Barb Schaetz, vice president of business operations at the Grand Ole Opry, said, “We don't have proposals on the stage a lot, but they do happen.“When it does, we try to make it extra special for them,” she said.Schaetz said the tour guide, Michaela McClain, was trying to make their moment as special as she could.To the newly engaged couple's surprise, the Grand Ole Opry then posted the proposal/engagement on the Grand Ole Opry Instagram and Facebook social media sites.Schaetz said the Instagram site has had over 14,900 likes and 167 comments from all over the world offering them congratulations and well wishes.“I think I'm still floating on a cloud,” said Wheeland, but she's already beginning to plan for a Sept. 25, 2021, wedding in Williamsport.“It's going to be a barn venue at a farm where I will be the seventh-generation member of the family that owns it,” she said.She might get a little more help from her fiancé, who's taken a new job in State College that's cutting his drive time to Wheeland's house from three hours to one.“I've spent my entire life listening to country music. Dreams can come true on that stage,” Wheeland said. “On that day, my dream came true. That's the best way I can describe it.”
