Attraction, yes, but the jokes clinched the deal for 64 years of marriage

Sometimes, the best way to a woman’s heart is laughter. It worked like a charm for Morrie Savich.

He was a young G.I. home from World War II where he served as a radio operator assigned to the 9th Air Force in Europe. No planes flew without Morrie giving them the thumbs up first.

He was the Allies weatherman, making sure when our bombers and fighter planes took off on a mission, the weather where they were going was good enough to get the job done. A lot rode on his forecasts every day.

Now, he was a civilian again, attending the University of Southern California on the G.I. Bill in 1948, trying to make another forecast. What were his chances of winning the heart of that good-looking nurse he had just met at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital, which became Cedar-Sinai Medical Center in 1961.

It was Valentine’s Day and the nurses decided to throw a party. All they needed were some men. They called one of the frat houses at USC and invited the guys over.

When Morrie laid eyes on Annette Gussman, the Allies weatherman was a goner. All he saw were clear skies ahead.

“My mom was an RN, but she told my dad at the party she worked in the laundry room of the hospital, as a joke,” said their daughter Linda Alper.

Morrie checked around and found she was pulling his leg. Two could play that game. The next day he went out and bought a bar of laundry soap, gift wrapped it in a box, and dropped it off at the hospital for her with a note.

“Congratulations, you have been nominated as Miss Laundry Bag of 1948,” he wrote. “Please accept this as a token of my esteem. I will be in touch with you shortly.”

Annette laughed and Morrie got in touch shortly. Four months later they were married — for the next 64 years.

“We were young and in love,” Morrie said last week at his 100th birthday party. “You don’t think about getting old. It just happens.”

The freeway drive from Simi Valley where they lived to the Jewish Home for the Aging in Reseda was getting to be a challenge for Morrie as he approached 90.

Annette’s Parkinson’s had grown worse and she needed the care the Jewish Home provided. Morrie had to live closer.

“When he moved in 11 years ago everyone fell in love with him,” said Monica Zuniga, assistant director of wellness care at Fairwinds Retirement Community in West Hills.

“The residents began to call him the mayor. Whenever anyone new moved in, Morrie would be the first one to greet them and show them around to make them feel comfortable.”

Every afternoon, without fail, he’d drive the six miles to the Jewish Home to be with Annette.

“Dad would spend hours just holding her hand and making her feel she was not alone,” Linda said. “It was just such a beautiful thing for the family to see. Complete devotion.”

The end was near for Annette, they both knew it. Sixty-four years of marriage, of love and laughs, was coming to an end.

She made him promise to keep the laughter alive after she was gone. Be the man you’ve always been. The life of the party.

And, that’s exactly what Morrie Savich was on his 100th birthday last weekend when Linda and her sister, Leslie Shillander, wheeled their still sharp-as-a-tack dad into a 1940s-era decorated activities room at Fairwinds filled with more than 50 friends and family just waiting to share old stories and laugh together again with the life of the party.

Remembering the good times when the Allies weatherman sent a bar of soap to Miss Laundry Box of 1948.

 

Dennis McCarthy can be reached at dmccarthynews@gmail.com.