Love story: Edna and Lou Meyers, East Patchogue

Edna Meyers of East Patchogue recalls how her husband Lou knew early on that she was the right girl for him.

I was 18 in September 1947 when I started working at the Patchogue-Plymouth Lace Mill or "Patchogue College," as many of us referred to it.

A young man named Lou, nicknamed Dutt, worked there as a machinist's helper. He was 17 and had been working at the mill for only a few months, but everyone knew him because his mother also worked at the mill.

We worked in the same department, the finishing room. I would fold the lace and pack it into boxes for shipping. He would fix the machines when they broke down.

Dutt began telling the girls working on the machines that I was the right girl for him, and if he had his way, he'd marry me one day. My friend told me what he was saying and added, "I'm telling you, Edna, he's gone on you." I didn't know what to think.

Then one night around Christmastime, as I was leaving work to catch a bus home to Center Moriches, I walked over to Dutt and gave him a kiss!

He asked me out for our first date in February. We went to the movies, and he picked me up in his father's car. There was only one real seat in the car for the driver. The passenger's "seat" was a milk crate, so I had to share a seat with Dutt.

At the movies, he was very respectful and was even afraid to hold my hand. My parents liked Dutt. Before long, we became a couple and began saving our money so we could get married and raise a family.

We married three years later, on July 2, 1950, at St. John's Roman Catholic Church in Center Moriches.

Dutt worked in construction and was owner and operator of Liftall Crane Service. He retired in 1982. He now builds birdhouses, which grace our yard and the yards of many others - he's given away more than 75 of them. I'm a full-time homemaker. We have three children and eight grandchildren whom we love dearly, and we have a great-grandchild on the way. For our 60th anniversary this year, we renewed our vows in a ceremony followed by a reception with family and friends. We've never regretted anything.

In 1998, we joined other former employees for a group photo in front of what was left of the Patchogue-Plymouth Lace Mill before it was demolished.