Photo By Tech. Sgt. Richard Mekkri | Retired Capt. John Lavrich and his wife Janet look through a box of their wedding...... read more read more
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USO Chaperones commemorate 50-year love story
The last time Capt. John Lavrich and his wife Janet were at The Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station, The Buckinghams “Kind of a Drag,” was #1 on the Billboard charts, the average monthly rent was $125.00, and the price of gasoline was $0.33/gallon.
On February 18, 1967, John Lavrich and Janet _____ were married at the base chapel. Five decades later, they revisited the place where they made the promise to love one another forever.
“We’re not party people,” said Jan. “We didn’t want any kind of celebration. We’d kind of just do our own thing.”
Gail D. Hofmann, Jan’s sister, had another idea. What if they went back to the place where it all began?
John and Jan loved the idea of but were unsure of how to go about getting on base. They’d tried years before but were unsuccessful. It had been during the heightened security of the post-9/11 world.
Hofmann took the initiative and called Congressman Chris Collins’ office. (DISTRICT?) She explained the situation and plans were set in motion.
“We just kind of wanted to see what it was like,” said Jan. “We wanted to come back again.”
After months of emails, phone calls and weather delays, John and Jan were finally coming back to the place where their story began.
“Things have totally changed,” said John after his base tour. He pointed to a space near the Visitor’s Center, “The BOMARC missile silos were over there.”
(Niagara was once and active duty station and home to the 35th Air Missile Defense Missile Squadron and housed BOMARC surface-to-air missiles. The 35th squadron was deactivated in December of 1969.)
In 1965, Jan belonged to the YWCA of Buffalo. There was a United Services Organization (USO) group that would come to the base for dances and Jan volunteered to chaperone.
“I enjoyed it, I got to know the girls and a few of the Airmen. And then…” she said, “John appeared.”
Like a well-rehearsed pair of stage actors, John, speaking in the third person, immediately picked up where Jan left off:
“John appeared because he was the Jr. Officer on base and he got all the dirty little jobs,” he said with a laugh.
John said that one of the ‘dirty little jobs’ was to make sure that the Airmen didn’t get themselves into any trouble at the dances.
“I had to be there to make sure that they kept on the up-and-up,” he said. “She was there to make sure the girls kept on the up-and-up.”
“And all of a sudden,” Jan said, with a bit of a sparkle in her eye, “We decided that dancing together was fun, too.”
Shortly after meeting as chaperones in 1965, John and Janet began courting. The United States was also deeply involved in Vietnam War. By January of 1967, they were engaged to be married and two days later, John received orders to the Philippine islands.
“For her to be on my orders,” John said, “we had to be married by March 1st.”
“The war changed our plans a little bit,” said Jan.
“It was absolutely devastating that I got the orders just a couple of days after,” said John. “That was a very dramatic thing.”
In a matter of days, John and Jan went from a wedding timeline of 6 months to a timeline of three weeks. Luckily, the couple realized that they had all of the resources they need right here on base. They would be married at the base chapel.
“Everything fell into place because it was held here,” said John. “We got the officer’s club. The fella who did our photos was an Airman. It was total military.”
“It was beautiful,” said Jan. “Everything just fell in line.”
Toward the end of their tour, after recounting stories that could easily fill volumes, I asked them the secret to marital longevity.
“We have the same interests,” said Jan. “We love to garden and like I said, we’re not party people. We love our home and our land.”
“I think that probably,” said John, “we just like doing the same things.”
“They never argue, they never fight,” said Hofmann. “Really, they’re so compatible. Two peas in a pod.”
| Date Taken: | 07.07.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 07.07.2017 16:30 |
| Story ID: | 240452 |
| Location: | NIAGRA FALLS AIR BASE, NEW YORK, US |
| Web Views: | 38 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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