Here's looking at you: Mary and Jerry Lewis

“Were you a tough teacher, “I asked Mary Lewis after she told me she graduated from Northwest Missouri State Teachers College in Kirksville, Ill., with a degree in education;

“No, I was a pushover,” laughed the Quincy, Ill., native.

She said she was teaching health and physical education for the Illinois school system at Camp Point when she met Jerry Lewis, and besides asking if he was a student, I made a Dean Martin joke; (Warning; Dean Martin is passé; Jerry growls)

Changing the subject, I asked how they met.

“I was on a bowling team, and after the games, we’d go to this college hangout … a bar, and he worked there – he was in the Naval Reserve, stationed at the training center,” she replied.

“And y’all saw each other across a crowded room …”

“No,” she laughed; Jerry grinned impishly; “he took my purse and dumped it on the bar.”

For more on this story, see the August 18 issue of the Navarre Press or subscribe online.