As it goes, 1966 was a pretty interesting year. The first episodes of Star Trek and Batman aired on TV, and the Oscar for Best Picture went to The Sound of Music. Truman Capote published In Cold Blood, the US Food and Drug Administration declared “the Pill” safe for contraceptive use, NASA launched Lunar Orbiter 1, Pampers released the first disposable diaper, and Dr Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas appeared for the first time on television.
All of that pales in comparison, of course, to the most wondrous event of the year, which took place on February 19, 1966 at St Michael’s Church in London, ON: the wedding of my parents.
According to the 50 year old newspaper clipping, “the bride chose a sheath gown of peau de soie with a scoop neckline and lilypoint sleeves. Lace trimmed the cathedral train. A flowered pillbox held her shoulder-length scalloped veil and she carried a bouquet of pink roses and white carnations.” I’m pretty sure my Dad was dressed, too, though the announcement makes no substantive mention of him or his attire.
On their foundation of love, a small but mighty empire was built. Both my brother and I were smart enough to follow our parents’ example, and to create happy families to carry on the traditions of unconditional love, quirky humour and family loyalty with which we were raised.
I wanted to illustrate the tsunami of love and happiness that resulted from the ripple of their union, and what better medium than stringing boxes upon boxes (and an external hard drive or two) of old family photos together into one slideshow? I knew I was on the right track when I made myself cry not once but twice while I was putting it together. It does run a little long, at just shy of seven and a half minutes, but it’s hard culling 50 years of love down to just a few highlights!
Sorting through 50 years of photos was a powerful reminder of the way photos mold and shape our memories, and I think in the end this is as much a gift to myself as it is to my parents. It was, however, pretty clear my Dad enjoyed watching the video as much as I did when he asked me to replay it not once, not twice, but three times in a row.
My parents have walked a long road together. They have lived the definition of love in good times and in bad, and my memories of childhood are framed by their constant and unshakable love for each other. From my parents I learned that the cornerstones of a good marriage are respect, patience, kindness, open affection, and humour, and that it’s quite possible to love someone even when you want to throttle them.
Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad. Thanks for getting hitched all those years ago, and making all of this possible. We love you!
It was meant to be – the world needed two great kids who provided 5 really gorgeous children – and it was our lucky turn.
Love Mom and Dad
Happy Anniversary to your parents! That’s a great video!
(Forgive me, but we are making book trailers at school right now and so we have been reviewing copyright, and knowing you are a content creator yourself…. Did you purchase a master license and a sync license for each of the songs featured here? I dont have time to watch until the end, so perhaps you did–I wouldn’t be surprised if you were using one of the great licensing services, after all. But if not, well, you might not want to share this work in a public forum such as this.)
Animoto for the win. Bless them for making the music so easy, right? (I love the layout option you chose, especially the way it tied together with the title cards at the end.)
Love you Mom! xo
Hey Jody, of course the copyright angle is something I have considered. I’d initially only intended to show this privately to my folks, but when I uploaded it to YouTube (marked as private), it tripped some sort of automatic music matching, so the views of the video are automatically monetized and directed back to the copyright holders. Once that was in place, I felt comfortable sharing it publicly, as them monetizing the views are essentially a license – and a considerably less costly one, too.