Brigitte Yarborough’s wedding dress was made of material from a parachute her mother had to make a deal to get.

The year was 1947, and Yarborough, a young German girl living in wartime Germany, was marrying an American soldier she had met through family.

“You could not buy anything at that time,” Yarborough recalled. “My mother traded cigarettes for a parachute.”

DRC/Barron Ludlum

Brigitte Yarborough, a resident of Good Samaritan Village, holds a wedding day photo. Her dress was made from a parachute. She married an American soldier, Kemp Yarborough, in Germany in 1947. Yarborough and others reminisced about their marriages during the Summer Love Celebration at the Denton retirement center.

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The parachute, made of cream-colored silk, was transformed by a seamstress into a beautiful wedding dress. “It looked very pretty,” she said.

Yarborough, who lost her husband, Kemp, more than a decade ago after nearly 50 years of marriage, and many other Good Samaritan Society residents recently gathered at the Denton campus on Hinkle Street to share their wedding memories at a reception honoring love.

“Because there are more weddings in June than any other month, we decided to call it the Summer Love Celebration to celebrate not only their spouses who are sitting beside them, but to honor the memory of those spouses who are no longer with them,” said Deirdre George, life enrichment coordinator at Good Samaritan Society-Denton Village. “Residents having the opportunity to tell their stories generates camaraderie among them.”

A week prior to the reception, a contest had residents guessing to see who could correctly identify the most people from a display of vintage photos. The names were revealed at the party of approximately 60 residents who dined on wedding cake, sipped ginger ale in champagne glasses and enjoyed listening to piano music while sharing favorite wedding stories. Several couples in attendance have been married more than 60 years.

“They were all married during the same era and shared similar experiences and emotions because of the war and the Depression,” George said. “I received many positive responses from this event because it not only allowed them to relive their treasured memories with each other, but it also gave them the opportunity to inspire the younger generations.”

“They had it all fixed up so pretty,” said Good Samaritan resident Juanita Enoch. “We heard some funny stories.”

Enoch, who was married to her husband, Jim, for 58 years, wanted to wait until the war ended before saying yes.

Enoch, 25 at the time and a teacher in Slidell, said her thinking was that she would rather lose a boyfriend than a husband.

“I’d always say, ‘When the war is over,’” Enoch said.

When it was, her fiance returned and proposed. She had purchased a new dress to wear when she greeted him.

“I did buy a new dress because I knew he was coming home. I didn’t make much money; I remember I bought a brown dress and a blue suit,” she said.

They set the date for the following weekend. While Enoch worked, 28-year-old Jim made the wedding arrangements. The couple was married by Dr. Frank Weedon at First Baptist Church in Denton, then just of off the Square on Oak Street. The church is now on Malone Street.

On her wedding day, she wore that brown crepe dress, a brown hat and high heels to the quickly planned ceremony that began their 58 years together.

As many brides do, Yarborough made something special from her gown made of parachute material: a Queen Elizabeth dress for her 4-year-old daughter’s doll.

Yarborough had only one dress, but she said “I do” three times. “I actually was married three times to my husband on three different days,” she said.

They married three times in Germany to cut through the red tape of satisfying differing local jurisdictions and the military.

The first marriage was performed by a justice of the peace on Nov. 8, 1947. They were married again by an Army chaplain in Munich a day later. The third time was six days later in a small church in Diersburg.

“It was the first time my family had been together since the war,” Yarborough said.

Returning to New York on a troop ship after they were newly married, Yarborough was one of 60 war brides. Aboard the ship, the couples were separated — the men were kept on the top floor and the wives on the lowest level.

“Some of those girls were rather loose,” Yarborough recalled.

LORI FORGAY can be reached at 940-566-6845. Her e-mail address is lforgay@dentonrc.com.