CARROLLTON – While many couples are out buying chocolates and making reservations for fancy dinners this Valentine's Day to prove their love to each other, one Carrollton couple is treating it like any other day together – like they have been doing for nearly 62 years.
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Dr. Bill and Marge Hopkins started their romance like a perfect Midwestern love story. She worked at a restaurant he frequented in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, and he was a veterinarian. She was 22 and he was 29. He invited her to a football game. She said yes. Five months later, they got married in her parents' house in 1957. After that, they moved to Carrollton where Dr. Bill Hopkins attained a veterinary clinic. He continued that practice for 49 years.
Today, the couple still lives in the same home they purchased six months after moving into Carrollton. They lived in a small apartment together until then.
When asked why she knew he was “the one” after less than six months, Marge Hopkins said she just felt it.
“I just knew,” she said. “He was a very kind man. I never saw him with a temper. I just fell for him, you know?”
Since then, Marge Hopkins credited their longevity to forgiveness, not holding grudges and not having any major issues. She said they are getting to the age where they know not to let things bother them.
Together, the couple has three children, five grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren. There is a 14th one on the way, she added.
In fact, the couple is planning on spending Valentine's Day preparing to go visit one of their grandchildren in Arkansas. Marge Hopkins said they were hoping to “head out before the weather got bad.”
