A local love story that stretches 75 years

On Valentine’s Day, 1942, Robert Clark and Virginia Blake married in a Baptist church in Chester. Robert grew up in Springfield, Vt.


www.sentinelsource.com    


Virginia has a photo of Robert at age 17. On the back of the frame, she attached a picture of young John F. Kennedy, who bore an uncanny resemblance to her husband at the time.

A local love story that stretches 75 years Robert and Virginia Clark Michael Moore / Sentinel Staff Robert and Virginia Clark Virginia Blake-Clark spends time with her husband, Robert, on the fourth floor of Maplewood Nursing Home in Westmoreland on Tuesday. Virginia has a room on a lower floor at the facility. House: Daily Chatter Promo 2016 - ROS - instory Posted: Wednesday, February 8, 2017 12:00 pm | Updated: 1:18 pm, Wed Feb 8, 2017. By Xander Landen Sentinel Staff WESTMORELAND — On Valentine’s Day, 1942, Robert Clark and Virginia Blake married in a Baptist church in Chester, Vt. Virginia had been hoping to hold the wedding ceremony during a warmer season, but with the country newly involved in World War II, the couple decided to move up the affair. “I figured if I was going to get married in the winter, I might as well pick a good day,” she said. Days later, Robert had to register for the draft in the middle of their honeymoon, and later that year began his wartime service. A special party is planned for Virginia and Robert Clark’s 75th anniversary on Tuesday at Maplewood Nursing Home in Westmoreland, where they both live. Virginia, 94, hopes she and her husband will be able to share the special day. But Robert, 95, who has dementia, is currently receiving hospice care at Maplewood. Doctors don’t expect he’ll live to pass the benchmark in the couple’s marriage. “Unfortunately it doesn’t look like my husband’s going to make it,” Virginia said. “We had a good life together, so I don’t have anything to complain about.” The party will go on, she says, whether they’re celebrating their anniversary together or whether the event becomes a celebration of his life. In the past 75 years, Virginia and Robert had four daughters, lived in nine states, and served in the Peace Corps after their kids were grown. Robert was a horticulturist and worked in a variety of positions that brought his family around the country. According to Virginia, Robert found many jobs on large estates where he would help develop and maintain gardens. The family would live on the estates with him, she said. Robert worked on estates in Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, Ohio and New Jersey, where the couple spent most of their life. He also served as landscape superintendent for Temple University in Philadelphia and as an arborist in St. Louis County in Missouri. When asked which of Robert’s qualities is her favorite, she stressed his “intense love for nature.” Virginia said Robert had a love for and curiosity of plants from a young age, as he grew up in Springfield, Vt. His father, who built houses, and his uncles, some of whom were masons and carpenters, didn’t understand his passion, she said. After he served in World War II, Robert held apprenticeships at greenhouses and went on to study nursery management at the Long Island Agricultural and Technical Institute. In a letter she wrote for Robert and hopes to read to him on their wedding anniversary, she marveled at his ability to identify plants and his extensive vocabulary and knowledge of “woody plants of the eastern USA.” She said his particular love was for trees. But as his dementia progressed, his knowledge of plant life has faded. “Since he came here four years ago, he couldn’t name hardly a tree. He lost all that,” she said. In 2012, Basil Sturgios, a professor of horticulture at a Venezuelan university and a family friend of Robert and Virginia’s, named a new species of tree he discovered in the central Brazilian Amazon after Robert. Sturgios wrote a dedication to Robert in the June 2012 Harvard Papers in Botany announcing the tree’s name: Campisandra robclarkiana. Virginia, who grew up on a farm in Chester, Vt., worked in many different places, including preschools and department stores. She also managed an estate and worked as a part-time employee in the office of the Student Conservation Association, a national nonprofit organization that gives youth experience in wilderness conservation and environmental protection, in Charlestown. “I’ve done a lot of different things, which I enjoyed,” she said. In 2013, Virginia published a two-part book about her adventurous life and marriage with Robert, entitled, “Uprooted, Transplanted and Thriving: Life with a Wandering Horticulturist.” After Robert retired in his 70s, the couple moved from New Jersey to Charlestown, where they lived in the 1940s, before Robert served in the war. During World War II, Robert served in the Coast Guard and was stationed for a time in New Jersey. He then worked as a signalman on ships in the Pacific. A photo on the shelf in Robert’s room in Maplewood shows him around the age of 22, aboard a ship wearing a white hat and grasping a lamp that was used for communication at sea. Virginia also keeps photos of Robert at her home in Maplewood’s assisted living apartments, including one of him at age 17. On the back of the frame, she attached a picture of young John F. Kennedy, who bore an uncanny resemblance to her husband at the time. She recalled when she first met Robert at a mutual friend’s birthday party in Vermont when she was 15. “I walked in and I thought, ‘Oh my goodness, who’s that nice-looking fella that’s sitting over there in the corner?’ ” A month later they attended church together; they’ve stayed together ever since. Virginia said one her fondest memories of Robert was the time they spent serving in the Peace Corps on the island nation of Samoa (then known as Western Samoa) between 1978 and 1980. She said the challenging nature of the experience brought them closer together. “In a case like that we sort of needed one another,” she said. While on the island, Robert helped Samoans develop a nursery and taught them how to grow edible plants, as well as trees. Virginia worked with preschool children. Displayed in Virginia’s apartment are brown cloth prints with geometric designs made from the inner bark of mulberry trees, which Samoans call tapa. They were given to Robert and Virginia as gifts before they left the island. After 75 years of marriage, Virginia offered a piece of advice for people who want to have long and successful relationships: “Don’t fret the small stuff.” She said couples often argue about little things that don’t matter. “You need to come to the point of realizing that it’s not getting you anywhere, so why continue it?” she said. She later laughed and explained that between her and Robert, she was usually the one who ended their arguments. Virginia visited Robert in his Maplewood apartment with a small group on Tuesday afternoon. It’s hard for Robert to communicate verbally, but he reacted to the visitors in the room, at times stretching out his arms, as if offering to shake their hands. As the group left the room, Virginia was settled in a chair at his bedside. “I think I’ll stay up here with him for awhile.”