A Great American Love Story

John & Annie Glenn met when they were just toddlers. Their parents came to New Concord at about the same time and soon became friends. When they got together for dinner, John & Annie would share a playpen. He writes in his autobiography, John Glenn, A Memoir, “She was part of my life from the time of my first memory.” By the time they went to high school, it was just expected, if there was something going on and boys and girls were going together, John & Annie would be a couple. “I don’t remember the first time I told Annie I loved her, or the first time she told me. It was just something we both knew.”

 

They were married on April 6, 1943 at the College Drive Presbyterian Church in New Concord. Their love and respect for each other are as genuine as can be. Annie’s heroic struggle with a speech disability while raising their two children as a Marine Corps wife and moving them many times, her triumph over the disability through the experimental Hollins College program, and her great generosity of time in encouraging those likewise afflicted, makes her story awe inspiring.

 

Throughout their entire lives, they have always been there to support each other. Annie still wears the $125 diamond engagement ring which John bought her in 1942. It’s never been replaced. The Glenns have two children: John David (born December 13, 1945) and Carolyn Ann (born March 19, 1947).  The Glenns have two grandsons, Daniel and Zachary, and two great grandsons.