John and Becky – A Love Story

John grew up outside of St. Louis, Missouri in a country schoolhouse his parents converted into a rural home. Becky grew up in Ottawa, Kansas, a small farming community southwest of Kansas City. John and Becky met each other in the summer of 1969. He had just graduated high school, she had just finished her first year of college. They were in Wichita with summer jobs working for the same company selling encyclopedias door to door. While plying their wares over the course of the summer, their traveling band of book peddlers set up shop in motels throughout Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming. By summer’s end they were in love but went their separate ways, he to Lawrence and she to Emporia, in pursuit of higher education. Love, however, prevailed and they got married in the summer of 1971. Becky left college and went to work so John could finish college, but then he tricked her by going to law school and she had to work three more years. In 1976 Becky became pregnant, John graduated from law school and passed the bar, they moved to Iola, Kansas, Stephen was born, and John won a hard-fought election to become County Attorney. He launched his legal career battling crime as a prosecuting attorney while also building a private practice. In 1979 Kimberly was born. In 1982 they moved back to Lawrence, taking the children with them. John hung out his shingle and Becky went back to work. The children grew up and moved to California. Becky finally retired from work in 2015. John took his shingle down in 2021 but continues to work some. Throughout it all, they remained madly in love, a condition that persists to this day.