Features

Courtney Ambrose Spears '05
Derek Spears '04
Derek: Courtney and I both minored in nutritional sciences, which is how we met, in a sports nutrition class taught by Professor Gale Carey. I began helping Courtney train for her marathon in Italy the following spring and we found we had a lot in common and became great friends. Thus began a spring filled with shopping trips, workouts, movies with friends, and fun adventures. We fell in love with each other after realizing how perfect we were for one another. We got engaged later that summer and on Nov. 11, 2006, we were married at Wagon Hill with the UNH Gents singing. We held the reception at Huddleston Hall.

Jacqueline Wilson Bergson '64
Henry Bergson '66
Hank: In the fall of 1962, I had had a disastrous freshman year and had been invited by UNH to, as we say, take a sabbatical. Rather than go home, I got hired as a firefighter so I could stay in Durham and take extension courses to redeem myself. One night, a group of firefighters who were in the forestry school decided to hang out with a group of female members of the UNH Marching Band, and I was invited to tag along. Jackie played in the band and was there. We hit it off and that led to dating, although she contends that if she had known that I had flunked out it would have been over before it started. In September 1963 the powers that be at UNH felt that I had been sufficiently reformed to re-enter UNH full time. We married in Jackie's hometown of Keene, N.H., in June 1966. We are still married after almost 43 years, with two great children. I have served for many years as a volunteer firefighter and am a former chief and currently chairman of the Board of Fire Commissioners in Katonah, N.Y.

Elizabeth Robbins Cilley '78
Gary Cilley '78, '98G
Beth: My sophomore year a friend and I were taking figure skating as a phys ed class. We were inspired by the Olympics, so just about every time Snively was open for rec skating, we were there practicing. We noticed a good-looking rink guard. He always wore a ski hat that had "USA" across the front. There were always little kids hanging on to him and sometimes a woman came to pick him up so we figured he was probably old, like 25, and married. We didn't know at the time that the kids were the house league team he coached and the woman with the car was his mom.

One night I pulled out my Freshman Record. There he was! I ran down the hall shouting, "Sue, it's USA! He's our age and he's from Durham!" I got an idea how to start a conversation. One of my best friends from elementary school had moved to Durham after 4th grade. They must know each other. I decided to wait until after skating was over and make my move outside Snively in the semi-dark. He will tell you that I jumped out of the bushes at him, but I was merely waiting next to them. I asked him if he knew my friend, and he said, of course, they were very good friends in high school, she lived in Jessie Doe and he would take me right over to see her. I started to panic. I hadn't seen Marsha since we were 10. What if she didn't remember me? We got to her room and she said, "Beth Robbins! I don't believe it!" (Thank goodness!) Marsha and I renewed our friendship, and I got the opening I had hoped for with Gary. We will celebrate our 30th anniversary in October 2009.

Bonnie Cormier Agrodnia '62
David Agrodnia '62
Bonnie: We met the first week of our freshman year at UNH. The initial meeting did not go well. We were in the dining hall. I was with my roommate, Carol Zajek Fryer '62, who was blond and very attractive. I was tiny and opinionated--my nickname was "Scrawny Bonnie." The conversation was more than a little contentious. I didn't realize that Dave was the key to the offense for Berlin High basketball team. I was from Portsmouth and I informed him that the Portsmouth fans didn't appreciate a "little squirt of a player" on the Berlin team, not realizing I was talking to the same. A few days later, Dave phoned. I took the call and didn't find out until later it was meant for Carol. Dave was a bit surprised when I showed up for a first date.

Later, when we were dating, Dave was initiated into Lambda Chi fraternity by having "Scrawny Bonnie" written on his rear end with a ballpoint pen. Shortly after curfew he rapped on the window of my room to tell me about the tattoo. This was pretty innocent, as he was fully clothed. But the house mother called the campus police to report that a "naked man was trying to enter the dorm through a window on the ground floor." Fortunately, the campus police discovered that Dave meant no harm and issued us a warning. It took much longer for the housemother to let it go.

There is a funny story about the Granite--they printed a photo of us standing in front of Murkland Hall, looking like a bucolic campus scene. Our kids think it's really funny because we were actually arguing at the time.

Marian Terry Stuart Eskijian '63
Gregory J. Eskijian '64
Gregory: We met freshman year. We were both engineering students at the time. It was unusual for a woman to be in chemical engineering, so Marian stood out. Freshman boys had a hard time meeting girls, and the men heavily outnumbered women on campus. I finally got a date with her in early 1960 but was pushed out of her life by upperclassmen. But I was smitten and while sidelined, not defeated. One evening sophomore year while driving home to Portsmouth, I decided to go for broke and ask her out. I spun around on Rt. 4 south of campus and headed back to Hitchcock Hall. I marched in and rang her bell. She came downstairs and I asked her out. She said yes. That was the beginning of my continuous pursuit until all the competition was frozen out. We were married on Aug. 28, 1964. To be honest, it was the best thing that happened to me at UNH. I got a great education and preparation for life, but I also came away with a wonderful lifemate. I am not a millionaire, nor am I famous, but I feel very rich for having her in my life for nearly 50 years.

P.S. In this March 1961 photo of us going to a UNH prom, Marian and I are on the right. On the left are Marc Dancause '64 and his date (I can't remember her name), Don St. Hilaire '62 and Diane Guidette '63. Marc was the best man at our wedding.