Florida Catholic | Married Love: Henry & Amelia

Henry and the Harley: Amelia’s love story

A Couple married for 70 years are among 240 honored at annual celebration of married love.

MARLENE QUARONI | FLORIDA CATHOLIC CORRESPONDENT

Published: 02.22.08

Henry Mlodzinski, 92, and his wife of 70 years, Amelia, 90, are greeted by Archbishop John C. Favalora at St. Mary Cathedral Parish during the annual Mass honoring married love.
MARLENE QUARONI | FC

MIAMI | Henry and Amelia Mlodzinski met 70 years ago at the Trianon Ballroom in Chicago. Amelia was 19. Henry was 21.

“We fell in love and married soon after that,” said Amelia, 90, of her husband of 70 years, Henry, 92. They were amomg the couples married the longest at the archdiocese’s annual Mass honoring married love, which takes place each year around Valentine’s Day.

Nearly 240 couples filled St. Mary Cathedral Feb. 16 for the ceremony, which is sponsored by the archdiocese’s Family Enrichment Center. Their years of married life ranged from 25 to 70, for a grand total of 11,500 years of marriage.

Amelia recalls riding on the back of Henry’s Harley-Davidson motorcycle on their honeymoon to Canada.

“It was July and I got a really bad sunburn,” she said.

Henry’s familiarity with motorcycles got him assigned as a military policeman during World War II, delivering messages in Germany on an Army motorcycle. Amelia was worried about his safety but he made it through the war and the couple continued their life together. Henry worked as an electronics engineer. Later, he and Amelia owned a diner-gas station in Lake Villa, Ill., for 20 years.

“It was called Dick’s Drive-In,” said Henry. “Alongside the restaurant was our gas station. I’d wear a chef’s hat in the restaurant. When someone drove up to the gasoline pump, I’d throw off my chef’s hat and replace it with a Mobil gas station attendant’s hat and run out to pump gas. People would get a kick out of that. We would all laugh. We had a lot of fun.”

Besides his sense of humor, said Amelia, Henry loves to sing.

“He sang for the Waukegan Philharmonic Orchestra,” she said. “And he would often sing in our diner as he worked with me and our two daughters.”

The Mlodzinskis don’t have the diner or the motorcycle anymore, but they still dance regularly at a Hollywood seniors club. The couple also exercise five days a week at the YMCA.

They attributed the longevity of their marriage to always being kind to each other and saying, “I love you.”

“You’ve spent a long time learning to grow and love,” said Father James Fetscher, pastor of St. Louis Parish in Pinecrest, who preached the homily at the Mass. “God gave you to each other to aid you on your path through life. It took the Spirit of God to create such an environment of trust.”

Couples married 50 years or more outnumbered those married 25 years.

“This is a sign of what’s happening in our society and the rate of divorce,” Father Fetscher said. “Faithfulness to marriage vows is not so strong as in the past. You jubilarians need to be models to our young people today.”

Archbishop John C. Favalora, who presided at the Mass, told the story of the couple married the longest in the United States, 83 years.

“They will be in the Guinness Book of World Records,” he said. “When asked, the couple said their formula for staying together centered on prayer and patience.”

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Henry and the Harley: Amelia’s love story

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