Long Term Lovers of Howard County
Frank Richard and Mary Janet (Shanklin) Rankins : 58+ Years
Married November 8th, 1943
Frank was born in Greene County and Mary in Linton, Indiana. They met one beautiful, starlit, warm Sunday evening in April, 1942. Frank and a friend were hitchhiking through Linton and stopped to listen to the singing outside a building where The Salvation Army was having church services. There was a car at the curb with a girl sitting in it holding a baby. One of the boys, Charlie White, went up and struck up a conversation. The other boy, being quite shy, leaned against a lamppost and began whittling on a piece of wood. The church services ended and the young people started coming out. Mary was one of them; she went over to the car and started talking to her sister, Jo. Charlie told Mary to leave her sister alone because he was talking to her, and suggested that she go over and talk to the other boy. Mary replied that she didn't know him. Charlie said, "His name is Frank. Now, go get acquainted." Mary did, or at least tried to, but Frank would not talk to her. Finally, her sister Clara (who as the eldest was taking care of the girls, since their mother was deceased) came to get the baby, put it in its buggy, and started home. Charlie said to Frank, "Come on, let's take the girls home," and he and Jo started following behind the baby buggy. Frank replied that he'd wait for him. After walking a few feet, Mary looked back and saw that Frank was walking behind them. She went back to walk with him, and then he went up to the front of the group. Mary followed, and the two went back and forth all the way to Mary's home a mile from town, all without Frank uttering a word.
The group got home and Mary was about to go into the house when Frank finally opened his mouth and asked Mary if she could go get a coke with him. Getting Clara's permission, they took off, Frank still not saying much. Having been told not to be gone long, the couple drank their cokes and listened to the juke box. Frank had a French Harp and had started playing it, when one of the notes blew out. He said, "That was the key of C," to which they all laughed and then they took the girls home.
Mary said she didn't care when Frank asked her if he could come to see her the following Wednesday. On Tuesday evening, Charlie came over to see Jo and told Mary to watch "that guy I was with the other night." When Mary asked why, Charlie said, "He told me on the way home that he was going to marry you." Mary replied, "He would hardly talk to me and already he's going to marry me! Fat chance!" But Frank did come over on Wednesday. The couple started dating, and did so until Uncle Sam pointed his finger at Frank, who left for the service in February of 1943. Getting leave in the middle of October, he and Mary were married by a Justice of the Peace on November 8, 1943. Since then, Frank worked at Continental Steel until he retired and Mary has been a homemaker. They have 6 children: Richard S., Jim, Michael, and the late Cranston Rankins, Pamela (Mrs. Gary) Blake, and Rebekah (Mrs. Doug) Hartley, 16 grandchildren, and 5 great-grandchildren.
Frank R. Rankins, 1924 -
Mary J. (Shanklin) Rankins, 1925 -
