Together since 1951, Newport Beach couple celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary
It started with a chance meeting at a summer camp in 1951.
Sid and Serene were camp counselors, both just 22 at the time, when they met in Idyllwild. Sid was set to finish up his undergraduate work at UC Berkeley on his return from the camp and Serene was planning to get a job teaching. The two spent every morning and every evening together and by the time that summer ended, the young couple decided they’d get married.
“When you’re together every day, it compresses the time requirement,” joked Sid Stokes, now 92.
“The proposal was simple,” Sid recalled. “Serene said, ‘While I have a job in Los Angeles County, I’m not going to let you get away. I’m going to go up there and live up there and be close to you.’ So, we didn’t go through this period of being geographically undesirable. There was something cementing about it.”
So, when summer ended, Serene moved up to Northern California to be with Sid, teaching in Oakland Unified School District while he finished his senior year at Cal.
The two married in Montebello on Dec. 30, 1951, just a few short months after they first met, and have been together ever since. Their siblings served as their ring bearer and flower girls. There was a bit of a challenge finding the floral arrangements the couple wanted because so much of the floral stock was being used to decorate floats for the 1952 Rose Parade. Happily, plants from a home garden filled the bill for the big day, according to one of their daughters.
It was raining, as it has been this week 70 years later, but the clouds parted just as Serene arrived and stepped out of the car to meet her groom.
The Stokes remarried on their 50th anniversary at the Temple Bat Yahm and were planning on having another ceremony on Thursday, the day of their 70th anniversary, but decided to cancel the proceedings out of concern about the winter surge of COVID-19 cases.
Their hands overlapped on the arm of the couch in their Corona del Mar home they’ve shared since 1988 while recounting their long lives together. Serene would smile, interjecting every once in a while as Sid explained how he was drafted during the Korean War and the places and years when their three daughters — Stacey Stokes, Susan Stokes and Sally Sefami — were born.
Serene said she taught while Sid was overseas, serving with the U.S. Navy. When Sid returned he took a job in the aerospace industry. At the time, through the late 1950s, they lived in the Bay Area but in around 1959 or 1960, they remember moving to New York for a brief time, but “neither the dog or the kids could stand the snow,” Sid recalls.
They would then relocate to Southern California, eventually landing in Newport Beach, which they’ve called home for decades. Serene continued her career in the educational field, eventually serving as principal at Washington, Jefferson and Remington elementary schools in Santa Ana. In later years, after her retirement, she served on the Newport-Mesa Unified School District Board of Trustees.
Sid, too, pursued his interest in education. He was an assistant superintendent of business for the Covina-Valley Unified School District by the time they came to Newport. He has participated in the Coast Community College District Foundation, the Newport Beach Sister City Assn. and the Newport Beach Navy League.
These days, they’re just enjoying living in Newport Beach and their time with their family.
Two of their daughters, Sally and Susan, have stayed local. Sally teaches Spanish at Sage Hill and Susan teaches at Newport Coast Elementary. Their eldest, Stacey, worked previously for the Supreme Court of California.
Between the three, the Stokes have eight grandchildren. They are spread all across the country in places like Boston, New York and Washington.
The Stokes’ advice for couples striving for a relationship as long as theirs?
“It’s very simple. We have been the public relations department for each other. We were shocked early in our marriage when we first met people, who the first thing they started talking about was their spouses and how bad they were,” said Sid. “We said, ‘That will never happen to us. We’ll never talk negatively about our spouses.’
“That’s our advice,” he said with a smile.
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