Working with the Webers: a photobiography celebrating 60 years together
By Kurt Johnson
Gerry and Judy Weber met at the Gold and Green Debutante Ball at Bay Meadows Racetrack in San Mateo, California. Gerry was a Southern California native, who was studying at Stanford University, near Judy’s home in Palo Alto. Judy attended the Palo Alto Stake’s dance with a co-worker from the sporting store where she was employed.
Because a number of girls in the stake did not have dates, the bishop asked some of the Stanford freshmen to take those young ladies to the dance. Gerry raised his hand and took Judy’s friend, Judy Gibson, to the ball. Their shared skill on the dance floor brought Gerry and Judy together when they traded dance partners that night and led to a romance that has lasted to this day.
I had the pleasure of interviewing Judy and Gerry for four hours, hearing the stories of their lives, writing the stories in their own words, and then compiling them into a Rememberize photobiography they can share with their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.
The stories include young Judy scaring off a potential kidnapper and Gerry riding a train from Los Angeles to Salt Lake City, beginning when he was a small child, to spend summers with his grandparents. He rode the train alone. Gerry shared his special relationship with those grandparents, what they taught him about love, and when he saw his grandpa rubbing his grandma’s feet.
The Webers strengthened each other as they shared their honeymoon with friends and family, spent seven weeks in a motor home with their kids on a cross-country trip to celebrate the bicentennial, and shared experiences with scooters, motorcycles, and the door being torn off Gerry’s Lincoln Mark II by a bus just before he stepped out of the vehicle.
This book is a fun collection of humorous and inspirational stories from a couple strengthening each other through good times and struggles, through good health and physical pain, and through it all learning that they are at their best when they do things together.
It’s the kind of book we love to produce at Rememberize, a collection of stories that combine to give family members a peek behind the curtain at the lives of the subject. Family members can open the book, read a reasonably short story that helps them get to know a loved relative, then set it down until they pick it up again to read the next one.
Amazing discoveries come when we research and write our histories. If you are looking for something to do with your extra time at home, we have a few suggestions. A good place to start is with writing the stories of your life. Need a little help or a little push? Visit our website (rememberize.com) or give us a call (801-337-9573) at Rememberize, and set up an appointment for a free consultation. We want to help you tell your stories.