Right Time Right Place

Differences brought them together, eventually

JoBeth and Phillip McElhanon met when they were just 10 years old, in Sunday School class at First Baptist Church in Blytheville. “JoBeth was really talented,” Phillip says. “And I was really shy — like painfully shy.”
JoBeth and Phillip McElhanon met when they were just 10 years old, in Sunday School class at First Baptist Church in Blytheville. “JoBeth was really talented,” Phillip says. “And I was really shy — like painfully shy.”

JoBeth Ross and Phillip McElhanon went to different schools, came from different sides of the tracks and had different personalities. Over time, they realized they had plenty in common.

They were in fifth-grade when they met -- 10 years old -- soon after JoBeth's family moved back to Blytheville after living for a couple of years in Jonesboro.

The first time I saw my future spouse:

He says: “At that point we didn’t have any friends in common. We had different personalities. We were completely opposite.”

She says: “I went into my Sunday School class knowing everybody and he was somebody I didn’t know.”

On our wedding day:

He says: “I just remember when the doors opened up and I thought how pretty she was.”

She says: “I remember the smell of the church. I wanted, when somebody walked into the church, just that scent of roses and Casablanca lilies and just the whole sanctuary smelled that way. I just wanted every sense to be touched.”

My advice for a long happy marriage is:

He says: “Don’t go to sleep angry. We go to bed together and we say I love you. There’s this understanding that we’re going to have this difference but we’re going to say that we love each other and we’re going to sleep together.”

She says: “When you get married, you are a family, the two of you. You don’t wait for kids to arrive.”

"His mother was our Sunday School teacher and they had just changed churches," JoBeth says. "I came back to my friends and he was there."

Phillip noticed JoBeth.

"Even when we were in the fifth grade she was in plays, she sang, she played piano, she danced. We were just kind of in the same room together," Phillip says. "She probably didn't notice me because I was really a wallflower -- I was very shy."

They were together during worship services, choir and Sunday School but rarely saw each other outside of church.

"In Blytheville, there were tracks that separated the east from the west. She was on the west side, which is where the country club and all that stuff is," Phillip says. "I was on the east side. I was from the other side of the tracks."

Phillip's older brother was dating JoBeth's best friend's sister.

"She would say, 'One of y'all needs to pay attention to Phillip. Why don't y'all like Phillip? Why isn't anyone going with Phillip?' It wasn't something I thought about," JoBeth says. "And then it was. Sometime in ninth grade we just noticed each other more."

Phillip and JoBeth started passing notes in church.

"In junior high, Phillip really blossomed with his personality," she says. "He was funny. He had a really good sense of style and because he had older brothers he was getting the college-boy style about him. That was interesting to me."

They hung out with the youth group on Saturday nights at the Old Hickory, an old barbecue pit the church had converted into a space for teenagers. They played pool and just enjoyed each other's company, and when Valentine's Day rolled around, JoBeth mailed Phillip a card.

He called her on the phone for the first time that Valentine's Day.

"We spent a long time on the phone," he says.

They met at the movies on Friday nights for unofficial dates, and after the show they would walk to Mazzio's for pizza. They shared their first kiss in a field behind that restaurant.

The Saturday night before spring break started, Phillip told JoBeth that his family was moving to Forrest City. A week later, JoBeth found out her family was moving to Charlotte, N.C.

JoBeth wrote Phillip letters -- and he responded with a few of his own, both struggling to fit into their new schools.

"He loves music and at the time country music was starting to have a resurgence but he was still into alternative music. So I would buy Rolling Stone and I would take the articles and I would find the cool ads and I would turn those into envelopes and that's what I would mail his letters in," she says.

They talked on the phone on Saturday nights after the long-distance rates went down, still racking up about $100 a month in phone bills. JoBeth's grandparents lived in southeast Missouri and Phillip would drive up to see her there when she visited.

After high school graduation, JoBeth went to Baylor University in Waco, Texas, and Phillip went to Arkansas State University at Jonesboro. Their phone calls continued, and JoBeth stopped at his parents' house -- they had moved to Beebe -- when she drove home to see her parents.

Her parents moved to western Tennessee during the summer between her freshman and sophomore years in college.

One weekend, she and Phillip went to Memphis.

"We had lunch and I laughed so much and we just had such a good conversation. I was just at the age where I realized this is more than just friendship," she says.

JoBeth transferred to the University of Central Arkansas in Conway to be closer to her parents and to Phillip and they continued to date while they both went to graduate school and started new jobs.

In May 1998, they had dinner at her parents' house.

"We were on her porch. It was a spring evening," he says. "She cooked. She had on a purple dress. I proposed and she said yes."

Phillip and JoBeth exchanged their vows on June 5, 1999, in First Baptist Church of Blytheville, where they met, surrounded by many of the people who had watched their relationship evolve over the years.

"Choosing our bridesmaids and groomsmen -- they were our friends. It wasn't like they were always his friends or always my friends," JoBeth says.

Phillip and JoBeth, now of Little Rock, were married for 17 years before they became parents. Their son, Harrison, is 20 months old.

"The great thing about having a shared childhood is that when I look back, when I reference something, he knows exactly what I'm talking about," JoBeth says. "It's nice to have those shared memories for so long and it's nice to have those different perspectives."

If you have an interesting how-we-met story or if you know someone who does, please call (501) 425-7228 or email:

kimdishongh@gmail.com

photo

Whitney Bower Imaging

Phillip and JoBeth McElhanon were married on June 5, 1999, in First Baptist Church of Blytheville, where they met as fifth-graders. They were married for 17 years before their son, Harrison, now 20 months, joined their family.

High Profile on 01/21/2018

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