Love this. My parents, married 1955, had no wedding photos, because they just drove over to Pascagoula one weekend and got hitched. This was after Dad got out of the Navy and was working and going to school in Beaumont, Texas; Mother was still in their hometown in northwest Florida. If there are any photos of my grandparents' marriages, I've never seen them.

I have no photos of my first wedding (justice of the peace in Vegas, 1990), but a big fat book of photos from my second wedding (church, 1997) that I feel peculiar about having but also peculiar about throwing out.

Ironically, my first husband does wedding photography now.

Getting back to your pictures, holy cow, WHAT are those bridesmaids wearing on their heads???

JanetLand, I'm cracking up over the way you asked that question. I sent these photos to a good friend of mine (who knows my parents) and who had a bunch of complimentary comments about the photos, and then asked what the heck was with the crowns on the bridesmaids?

I honestly don't know. In those days a woman had to wear a hat to church. Maybe this was the only they could find that would go, though I should think they'd have been dyed to match. I've seen one of the bridesmaid dresses, and they were of a yellowy-green taffeta that might have looked smart in ths sixties but that looks very unappealing to modern eyes. Or more likely it was just something that everyone thought looked nice at the time.

I know there's a photo of my great-grandparents as a bridal couple, circa the 1890s. I saw it published in the Stouffville paper some years back as part of a "from the archives" feature they used to do. My great-grandfather was Reeve of Whitchurch-Stouffville in the days before it had a mayor, so he was considered historically significant to the town. I'll have to see if I can get a hold of it.

These are beyond awesome.

Well, all bridesmaid dresses are ugly by definition, these days, yesterday, whenever. Even if they look nice on the day, they immediately become hideous as soon as the festivities are over. It's some kind of cosmic law.

The dresses themselves aren't bad, but those crowns! I love love love the photo of your mum and dad getting into the car after the ceremony.

What church were they married in? It looks rather plain to my eyes.

I can see both of their faces in yours. Yay genetics!

There aren't any official photos of my parents wedding, but there are of my mum and her sisters (her bridesmaids) before the wedding and the cutting of the cake. And I've never seen a photo of my (maternal) grandparents wedding; I have a feeling they were destroyed or thrown away by my grandmother.

The church they were married in was Bloomington Gospel Church on the Ninth Line, just north of Stouffville. It was built in 1892. When I was a child it had a shed out back that was used for parking (and in summers for Vacation Bible School) and that had rusted rings in the walls that people used to use to hitch up their horses. They seem to have torn it down, and they've also built a large veranda in front of the church that was not there in 1962 — or even as late as 1989, when my family moved away from the area. When I posted these photos on Facebook a friend of mine whose parents attended - and whose father was recently buried from - Bloomington church - told me she recognized the church immediately, as it still looks the same inside.

Yes, I look a little like both of them. I think I take after my father the most in looks, though.

It does seem a shame not to keep wedding photos if you have children or grandchildren who might want to see them!

Ontario! I was going to say it looks a little more Midwestern than Mad Men. But love the style. I wish I had the face for cat's-eye glasses. Instead of looking hip and sassy on me, they just make me look too much like an actual 60s matron.

It's a small, rural church. Definitely no big-city vibe there.

I offered to photoshop out my mother's glasses. She glared at me and said, "What's wrong with the glasses?" Heh. But you know, after thinking those glasses looked irredeemably ridiculous and ugly for most of my life, they have actually started to look fine. Not anything I'd want to wear, but becoming and even stylish in this context.

The glasses are great on your mum, they'd look ridiculous on me.

Thanks for the info on the church. I was wondering which denomination, but the info you gave made it easy to find out (Evangelical).

I'll have to ask my mum about the photos. I've wondered about them before, but for some reason never asked.

Wow, popular week for weddings. My parents were married exactly a week later, on August 25th, 1962. (In Prescott, Ontario, because the church in Kemptville was being repaired or was otherwise occupied or something.)

Also my brother's wife's parents were married on Aug. 25, 1962.

I just finished scanning a bunch of colour slides from my parents' wedding day.
I have NO IDEA what we are doing for their 50th, however. They are talking about going to Europe.

I went out to the Loblaws' photo counter on lunch and am having 5 x 7 prints made of the photo of my grandparents', and the "getting out of the car" shot of my parents for $2.24 total. Awesome. I'm going to frame them and put one in my room and one in the guest room.