“We still love each other,” Kermit Eastman tells PEOPLE about his long marriage to wife Betty
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
NEED TO KNOW
- Betty and Kermit Eastman, both 99 years old, recently celebrated their 80th wedding anniversary
- The two met when they were teenagers and later married when Kermit returned from serving with the Navy during World War II
- Today, they share two children, five grandchildren, 11 great-grandchildren, and three great-great-grandchildren
Not many married couples can claim to have been together for 80 years, which is also known as an oak anniversary. But the exclusive club recently welcomed two new members: Kermit and Betty Eastman, both 99.
“We still love each other,” Kermit, of St. Cloud, Minn., tells PEOPLE about the secret behind their enduring relationship.
The Eastmans — who share two children, five grandchildren, 11 great-grandchildren, and three great-great-grandchildren — were surrounded by loved ones when they celebrated their 80th wedding anniversary on June 6 at daughter Vicki Landwehr’s home.
“We were kind of a card-playing family,” Vicki, 71, says of the special family gathering. “My mother started the tradition of when you win, you get a prize. It started off with things from the dollar store. But now it’s evolved into envelopes with cash in them. A lot of cash in the envelopes keeps getting larger.”
Their romantic relationship began back when Kermit and Betty were just two teenagers living across the street from each other.
”I remember her dad saying. ‘I wonder what that Eastman boy is doing out there. He’s walking up and down in front of our house in the wintertime,’ ” Kermit recalls. “I was just getting up the nerve to ask her to go to a movie.”
Asked what her initial impression of Kermit was at the time, Betty says, “Oh, I just don’t remember too much, but it must’ve been great because I went to the movie with him.”
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
Both attended high school together until Kermit dropped out during his junior year to enlist in the Navy during World War II. In April 1945, he was aboard the USS Mullany when it was hit by a Japanese kamikaze plane, forcing him and others to abandon ship.
“I couldn’t really swim, but I managed all right,” he recalls. “I thrashed around in the water enough and finally got a hold of a line and got onto a motor wheel boat and got pulled out. There were a lot of guys on that motor wheel boat and we were picked up. We were okay.”
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
When he returned to the U.S., Kermit went back to finish his junior year at high school in the spring of 1946. By then, Betty had already graduated — and that June, the couple got married.
As for what their families thought about them getting married at a young age, Kermit says he remembered them being “very much in favor of it.”
”They thought, ‘You couldn’t find anyone better,’ and of course I agreed with them,” he adds.
Their daughter interjects to say that throughout her childhood, her dad “took a great deal of joy out of telling people that he lived with a girl during his senior year of high school.”
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
Kermit eventually completed high school and went on to college.
Although they’d go on to live in North Dakota for a time, by 1959 it was back to St. Cloud, where Kermit became director of elementary education. A decade later, he became superintendent, a position he held until 1983.
Meanwhile, Betty was a stay-at-home mom raising the couple’s two kids.
For a time, the two lived in the country, where Kermit raised horses and Betty, despite not being a big fan, helped take of them.
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
Years later, when she was 86 years old, Betty was diagnosed with breast cancer.
“She had a lumpectomy and then chemotherapy and radiation,” Vicki says. “My dad took her to all her appointments.”
“[You] just kinda keep going and pray for the best,” Kermit says about being there for Betty during her illness.
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Last November, the couple, whose love story was previously reported by CBS affiliate WCCO, moved into a senior living facility — a convenience for Betty, who says she can’t cook anymore, even though Kermit admits that they don’t fraternize much with the other seniors at the facility.
“We’re a little different even from the residents here. We’re both 99,” he explains. “Most of the residents are not that old.”
Credit: Vicki Landwehr
When it comes to her parents, Vicki knows how lucky she is.
“I don’t really have friends who have parents living anymore,” she says. “To have both of them is pretty unusual.”
It’s a similar sentiment shared by Declan Frantesl, 19, Vicki’s grandson, about having great-grandparents.
“I’m beyond blessed and so grateful to have them in my life,” Declan says. “It’s something that truly means a lot to me. Family is really important. And I would say it started with Kermit and Betty. They really instilled the family-first mentality. It means the world to have them here.”
As for what’s next, Kermit references another upcoming milestone for the couple: their 100th birthdays next year.
He adds with a laugh, “We’re just looking forward to those ages, huh?”
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