Maxwell - 60 years

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- Bob and Mary Jane Maxwell of Charleston recently celebrated 60 years of marriage with a family trip to the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee. And without a doubt, this loving couple -- parents of three children and grandparents of six -- bickered the whole way there.

Mary Jane Brown and James Robert Maxwell were married on May 31, 1958, at the Brown family home in Charleston. They were both 18. They had met at Charleston High School and began dating in 1957 after Bob transferred in his junior year from Sikeston, Missouri.

Bob was captivated by Mary Jane's beauty and sophistication. And he found her job at the town swimming pool especially appealing. "She could get me in for free," he says. The entrance fee was 50 cents.

For Mary Jane, the attraction started with Bob's stand-out athleticism on the Charleston Blue Jays football squad and his black and white saddle oxfords. "No one else had those shoes," she recalls. "He was different. He was smart, and, really, he was a smart aleck too."

A year after they wed, their first daughter, Sarah, arrived. Bob worked for Simpson Oil Company, Prudential Insurance Company and Kas Potato Chip Companuy, while Mary Jane stayed home with Sarah. Within a few years, the couple moved to Cape Girardeau, where son Rob was later born, followed by daughter Lesli.

Bob was a salesman with Procter & Gamble, a youth baseball coach, an avid golfer at Kimbeland Country Club and an early-morning coffee-drinking regular at the Colonial Tavern, Mr. C's, Shoney's and the Pancake House. Mary Jane was a long-time employee in the bakery at Schnucks, where she had legions of customer fans. She was also a fearsome bridge player.

They remained in their home on Woodland Hills Drive for nearly 40 years before returning to Charleston in 2010.

For decades, the Maxwell children have marveled -- and laughed -- at their parents' knack for finding argument in such inconsequential matters: over the width of bed sheets in a New Orleans hotel; whether it was a Tuesday or Wednesday when one of them went to a doctor's appointment; and if it had been two days or three since Bob had last shaved.

Congratulations to Bob and Mary Jane on 60 years of arguing and loving.