Don was 90. Maxine, 87.
They met in 1952 at a bowling alley in Bakersfield, California, and got married that same year. He was an engineer and she was a nurse, parents to twin children they adopted from a German orphanage, and grandparents to five grandchildren who grew up seeing them as an example of what lasting love looks like when it is chosen every day.
On August 6, 2014, Maxine died first, in the same room where they had spent their final days. As her body was being removed from the bed, Don followed her four hours later. Their granddaughter, Melissa Sloan, photographed them holding hands until the very end. “All he wanted was to be with his beautiful wife”, she later recounted. Nearly 62 years of marriage, and not even death could separate them for long. 🥹