Each love story is unique. Some people look for the love of their lives for years. Some people are lucky enough to find the person they will be with forever right away. When James Garner met Lois Clark, it was love at first sight.
James Garner and Lois Clarke had met at a barbecue hosted by a friend.
He knew right away that she was the one.
He asked her to dinner right away after asking her out.
In the 2012 memoir that James Garner wrote about his life, he wrote:
I fell in love for the first and last time on August 1, 1956, at an Adlai Stevenson for President barbeque. That’s where I met Lois Clarke. It was love at first sight. The thunderbolt. She was as beautiful as she was sweet… It was a barbeque and I ended up in the pool with the children.
They dated for two weeks.
They ended up getting married after that.
The ceremony took place at a courthouse in Beverly Hills on August 17, 1956.
Almost everyone didn’t approve of their marriage.
His own family was the first group to fight against him.
From their points of view, the two were very different. If they don’t have anything in common, they’ll probably break up and end up hurting each other.
First, Lois was Jewish, and James Garner was a Methodist. She was from Los Angeles, and he was from Oklahoma. James Garner was also getting married for the second time.
At six feet and three inches, James Garner was taller than Lois. She likes to stay inside, while he likes to be outside. He thought he was a realist, while she thought she was a dreamer.
James Garner and Lois Clarke didn’t care about any of these things.
He shared:
None of the naysayers had stopped to consider that Lois and I complemented each other. What they saw as weaknesses, we saw as strengths.
Together, James Garner and Lois Clarke built their family.
Lois got married, and she and her husband had a daughter.
She was named Gigi.
James Garner eventually took in Kim, who was Lois’s first child. This made their small, happy family complete.
Their marriage was not at all perfect.
Just like most couples, they had disagreements and problems.
In fact, they were apart for about three months in 1970.
There were rumors that James Garner dated a guest star on The Rockford Files, but he always denied it.
He said:
Lois and I were never in serious trouble. Ninety-nine percent of the problem was the pressures of Rockford. It wasn’t us, it was me needing to get away to get my head together.
Their marriage lasted nearly 60 years.
James died of natural causes at the age of 86, and they were still together at the time.
Even though they had only known each other for 14 days before they got married, they were able to deal with the problems that came their way.
Their story shows that if two people are meant to be together, love will find a way, even if they seem very different.
