Celebrating Black Brides: Profile #69

Couple: Alice Clement and Robert Joseph Foster

Date of Wedding:  December 23, 1941

Place: Sisters Chapel, Spelman College (Atlanta, GA)

Officiant: Morehouse President Benjamin Mays

Fun facts:

The date of the wedding, December 23, was significant for the bride's family.  It was the day that her parents had married years earlier.  December 23 was also the birthday of the bride's grandfather, Bishop George C. Clement of the AME Zion Church

The bride wore an ivory satin gown fashioned with a long bodice.  The neckline was embroidered with seed pearls and rhinestones.  Her only jewelry was a strand of pearls given to her by the groom.

The bride graduated from Spelman College in June 1941 and was a student at Julliard School of Music at the time of the wedding.  The groom graduated from Morehouse College and Atlanta University. 

The bride was the daughter of Atlanta University President Rufus Clement.

In 2010, best-selling author and journalist Isabel Wilkerson profiled the groom in her award-winning book, The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration

Celebrating Black Brides: Profile #14

Couple: Nicholl Lewis and Dr. Michael Young

Date of Wedding: September 22, 2012

Place: The Biltmore Ballrooms (Atlanta)

Officiant:  Elder Mary W. Young (the groom's step-grandmother)

Fun facts:

The bride and groom worked at the same place at the same time and never crossed paths (Emory Healthcare in Atlanta).

The first time the groom's mother met the bride, she said “She’s a keeper!” That may have sealed the deal. 

The bottom of the bride's dress caught on fire during the ceremony and she didn’t know about it until later. The mother of the bride and a friend put it out. The bride finds it funny now, but she would have been mortified, had she known what was going on at the time.