9 minute read
Sweethearts
Salvador and Lisa Lopez WOODROW CLASS OF 1989 AND 1991
Salvador Lopez remembers his future wife Lisa giving him her phone number when they met as students at J.L. Long Middle School. When he never called, he told Lisa he lost it.
Whether he actually lost it or was saving face with a convenient excuse, Lisa may have harbored hard feelings. When they reconnected during Salvador’s senior year at Woodrow, he had to work to get back into her good graces.
“I wasn’t attracted to him at first,” Lisa says. “They put him in two of my classes, and he kept bugging me. He’d want to walk me from class to class. He would tell me I was pretty. In math, he would give me the answers.”
The students could not have been more different. Salvador was a member of ROTC, the soccer team and multiple clubs. He was voted Mr. Wildcat his senior year. Lisa just wanted to go to school. But Salvador’s persistence paid off, and Lisa agreed to give him another chance.
“We went for a ride in his car and haven’t been apart since then,” she says.
Just three months before her graduation, Lisa realized she was pregnant and dropped out of school. She delivered their first child, Jessica, in August and enrolled at Woodrow a month later to complete her senior year.
Salvador and Lisa dressed Jessica in a cheerleader’s uniform and took her to all the football games. She got ready with her mom on prom night, and she was in the audience when her mom received her high school diploma in 1991.
“She was the Wildcat baby,” Lisa says. “She got to experience all those things with us.”
The couple married in 1992 and had their second child in 1993. They now have four children ranging in age from 14 to 30. Three have graduated from Woodrow, and the
The Lopezes at prom in 1991. Photography courtesy of Lisa Lopez
youngest plans to attend next year when he graduates from J.L. Long.
“The experience made us the family we are today — our values and morals,” Lisa says. “They wanted to go to Woodrow because they knew what our experience was. We always talked and shared our story about how we met. They wanted to seek those [experiences] out.”
Salvador and Lisa raised their family in Mount Auburn, the same neighborhood where they grew up. Their house is just a short distance from Woodrow, and they like to walk around the school and talk about their memories. They still remember where Salvador parked his Chevy Chevette and the teacher who called them mom and pop.
“I loved walking the halls, holding his hand and stealing smooches behind the lockers,” Lisa says. “I’m glad they took them out since my kids went there.”
Their advice: Be open and honest. Talk and listen. Don’t judge when you have those conversations. Be compassionate.
Dallas and Linda Neeley WOODROW CLASS OF 1959
When Linda met Dallas in junior English class at Woodrow Wilson High School, his shoes were the first thing she noticed.
“He had the sexiest shoes I’d ever seen,” Linda says. “They were real pointed toes. My daddy never wore shoes like that.”
From that first look, she started plotting ways to spend more time with him. During summer vacation, all her classmates congregated at Vickery Park pool. One day, she told her girlfriends to leave without her so she could ask Dallas for a ride home.
“I told him, ‘I can’t believe this. My friends went off and left me,’” Linda says. “Years later, he said, ‘What would you have done if I didn’t give you a ride home?’ I wasn’t worried. I figured he would.”
The couple dated steady all through senior year, but they agreed to see other people when they graduated and went to college. Dallas attended the University of Texas, and Linda enrolled at what is now the University of Texas at Arlington. The pair reconnected when they returned home for the
summer after their first year.
“We hadn’t met anyone else as wonderful…and no one else wore those shoes like he did,” Linda says.
They married in 1960 and had the first of two children in 1961.
Linda and Dallas moved across the country — first to St. Louis, then to Memphis, Miami and New York City — for Dallas’ job selling shoes. The business was in his blood. His father worked as a shoe salesman and got Dallas a job selling footwear as a high-schooler.
The first Christmas after the couple started dating, Dallas wanted to use his shoe sale money to buy Linda a silver necklace with a dangling heart charm, complete with a diamond in the center. When Dallas told his father about his plan, his dad said, “You’re not going to spend your hard-earned money on some girl you’re never going to see again.” Dallas bought the necklace anyway, and Linda still wears it to this day.
Their advice: Marriage is forever. Just stick it out. You may have arguments and disagreements, but it always gets better.
Steve and Libby Voltmann BRYAN ADAMS CLASS OF 1970
Steve and Libby Voltmann have been married for almost 50 years. What’s their secret to a lasting marriage? Laziness.
“We were too lazy to move out whenever we had trouble,” Steve says. “After a time, we fell back into not being mad at each other.”
The neighborhood has been part of the Voltmanns’ story since they met as juniors at Bryan Adams High School. Libby saw Steve getting on his motorcycle from across the parking lot and was instantly attracted.
“I was like, ‘That’s him. That’s what I want right there,’” Libby says. “It was an innate thing in me. Even today, he’ll walk into the room, and I’m still like, ‘You’re so handsome.’ I think he was excited about the attention, but it took him longer to settle in with me. We’ve always had a really good time together.”
The couple continued to date after they graduated from Bryan Adams, but they broke up briefly before they got married, upsetting them both. The pair arranged for Steve to collect his belongings from Libby’s apartment, but Libby, who was working as a flight attendant, misread her work schedule and missed the rendezvous. She was so frantic during the flight that she spilled a tray of orange juice on the floor. When she landed, she rushed to a payphone to call Steve.
“I didn’t want him to think I had blown him off,” Libby says. “I said, ‘I don’t want to do this. This is terrible. Let’s get married.’ He said, ‘OK, let’s get married.’”
Much like the proposal, the wedding was a spur-of-themoment decision. Steve woke up late for work, and instead of rushing to be on time, Libby suggested he call in sick so they could get married. They took a day trip to the Rockwall courthouse and celebrated their nuptials with horrible pink
The Voltmanns graduated from Bryan Adams in 1970. Photography courtesy of Libby Voltmann
Champagne and dinner with Steve’s mother.
“We were 21, but we thought we were plenty old enough,” Libby says. “Most of our family was disjointed, and no one was concerned about what we were doing.
“My father didn’t talk to me for 10 years because I married him. He thought I should marry a doctor, lawyer or rich guy. Steve was just a hippie. He has turned out to be the best man ever — all the things my father was not: a stable, loving, good father.”
Advice: People love differently. Steve loves me in a quiet, steady way. I love him in an emotional, passionate way. Learn to understand that.
TM
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