Walk along the Lakefill and you’ll see rocks painted with poems and declarations of love, crudely drawn hearts and marriage proposals — all evidence of Northwestern romances from years past. For hundreds of alums, these simple college courtships turned into longlasting marriages. We contacted dozens of couples from Northwestern’s past; two of them shared their stories.
Resident meets the RA, and romance ensues
Returning to Northwestern campus with her new fiancé, Lynn Ryan saw the Rebecca Crown clock tower smiling down at her.
“My friend Ben was really good with credit cards and getting into things,” Jim Williams said. “He climbed up somehow and put some cardboard on the clock tower, so when it lit up it looked like a smiley face.”
Lynn and Jim Williams became engaged on May 21, 1982, but they met in Foster-Walker Complex two years earlier. During what Jim calls “finals food,” Lynn introduced herself as Jim’s new Resident Assistant.
Housing had assigned Williams to help tame rowdy House 6, which was two-thirds male. She found a husband there instead.
The two started dating right before the Thanksgiving of 1980, when Lynn was a junior and Jim was a senior at Northwestern. On their first date, Lynn and Jim went to see Fantasia, a movie Lynn will never forget.
“It was one of those things you pretend that you’re interested, but I really hated it,” Lynn said. “I thought it was horrible.”
Luckily for Jim, Lynn was able to look past his taste in cartoon movies — and his clothing style.
“One weekend my sister came to town, and Jim was wearing a plaid, flannel shirt, jeans, geeky shoes,” Lynn said. “She was less than impressed.”
When the Housing Office found out that one of its RAs in Foster-Walker was dating a resident, they weren’t thrilled.
“There was no rule against, but they definitely weren’t happy about it,” Lynn said.
Unlike other couples in their groups of friends, Jim and Lynn spent most of their dates in Chicago, exploring Michigan Avenue. The couple also frequented Second City, blues clubs, and Cubs games.
The night that Jim popped the question, he took Lynn to dinner at the Blackhawk, an old Chicago restaurant.
“He must have told the guys at the next table what he was going to do, because when I came back from the bathroom they were all smirking at me,” Lynn said.
After dinner, Jim proposed along the Chicago River. At first, he planned to bring two ring boxes and pretend to drop one in.
“It’s a good thing he didn’t,” Lynn said. “Or one of us probably would have ended up in the river.”
Lynn accepted the proposal, and the couple married on December 30, 1983. Ben, the student who put a smiley face on the clock tower, was part of the wedding. “We were married on the coldest recorded day in western Pennsylvania. It was 9 below,” Lynn said. “It was our reminder of Chicago.”
Jim and Lynn now have five daughters: Elaine, 20, a Medill sophomore at Northwestern; Maggie, 18, who will attend Vanderbilt next year; Brigid, 15; and two girls adopted from China: Ling Er, 9; and Mai, 8.
“We brought the girls to Northwestern more times than I can count. They were here all the time. We tried to brainwash them, and it worked on Elaine,” Lynn said. “We were so excited when she decided to come here.”
Northwestern couple met 40 years ago at NU student union
Eugene and Holly Sunshine only recently realized that this year’s Valentine’s Day would hold special significance – it’s the 40th anniversary of their first meeting, in Scott Hall.
On February 14, 1968, Eugene Sunshine and Holly Leach stood in the former student union anticipating their interviews for NUgarde, the freshman orientation program. They stood around with a bunch of other nervous, twitchy underclassmen, comparing notes, wondering what they would be asked.
When Gene finished his interview, Holly quizzed him on what to expect. They didn’t know each other well, but when Holly finally finished her own interview, Gene was still waiting.
“I hadn’t gotten her name. I didn’t know who she was,” Gene said. “So I waited, and asked her if she wanted to get a cup of coffee.”
Holly, however, already had plans.
“I thought, ‘This guy was kind of cute,’ but I couldn’t, because it was Valentine’s Day, and I had a date waiting for me in Allison Hall,” Holly said. “So I told him, ‘No I can’t, but I’d like to some other time.’”
When Holly reached Allison, she asked her date to stay downstairs while she ran upstairs and looked up Gene in her freshmen directory.
“It didn’t have pictures. We didn’t have Facebook then. You could see where they were from and whether they were in a sorority or a fraternity,” Holly said. “I was thinking, ‘Sunshine? Did I really hear that right?’”
In 1968, girls waited for the boy to make the date. Unfortunately for Gene, setting up their first date would be more difficult than flipping through pages to learn her hometown and major.
“In those days, people really dated. [Girls] would date multiple people at a time,” Holly said. “And [the guys] would call Sunday or Monday to ask you out on Friday or Saturday. For two weeks in a row, I already had dates for the weekend when Gene called. But he kept trying.”
Three weeks after their meeting, Holly and Gene finally had their first date, at a student production of “A Man for All Seasons.” A second date followed and pretty soon the two were in a relationship.
Gene said that the biggest problem they faced was Allison Hall, where Holly lived. All female students lived on South Campus and males lived up north — Gene lived in McCulloch. Girls were required to be back by 2 a.m. or face punishment, which cut short dates and removed their intimacy.
“Everyone would be jammed into Allison lobby. The room would be packed, and you would try to say good night to your date,” Gene said. “Everyone was so close that if you went to kiss her and missed, you would have hit someone else.”
Holly and Gene got engaged in March 1973, the year after they graduated from Northwestern. Both originally from the East Coast, the Sunshines lived in Connecticut until 1997, when Gene became Northwestern’s senior vice president of business and finance.
Their Northwestern legacy continues through their children as well: son Brad graduated from Northwestern in 2001 and daughter Emily will finish her master’s education from the School of Education and Social Policy in June.