Grateful for love, health, and a happy family

When the friend who convinced her to go to the party disappeared with her boyfriend, Kathy, in a house full of strangers, realized she had no way home.

“She seemed a bit concerned, which is why I sat down next to her,” remembered Jim, a cousin to one of the people whose engagement the spring 1970 party celebrated. “She told me her story of abandonment, and I offered to drive her home.”

“I relaxed then, and we talked at the party until around 11,” said Kathy. They talked the whole way from Broomall to her home in Havertown, too.

“She was a cute girl, so I asked for her number,” said Jim, who lived in Springfield.

They spent their first date walking around Center City during Earth Week. While activities were happening around them, they only remember being with each other.

“He was fun to be around, and I was very comfortable with him,” said Kathy. “He comes from a large family [six kids] and so do I [eight kids]. And we’re both Catholic.”

Jim is a Vietnam veteran who trained as an interpreter with the Army Security Agency and served two overseas tours. He was discharged in 1969 and was then working toward his business administration degree at Temple University.

“I liked that he was continuing his education,” said Kathy, who was herself determined to get a degree and taking night classes at Delaware County Community College while working as a secretary at General Electric.

“We enjoyed a lot of the same things,” said Jim. “We are both interested in sports and would go to the Palestra to watch basketball games.”

They quickly became a couple.

Kathy and Jim stood in line for the movies on a chilly Valentine’s Day 1972. She was cold. “I put my hands in his pocket, and there was the ring box,” Kathy remembers. She took out the box, opened it, and put the ring on her finger.

“We knew that we were going to get married. She knew a ring was coming,” Jim said. “I had planned to ask her after the movie, to sit down and pull that box out of my pocket by myself,” he says with a laugh.

“I gave you a little help,” Kathy said.

They married that May 19 in a traditional Catholic ceremony with a full Mass in the chapel at Villanova University, where Jim had a summer maintenance job. They and 150 guests celebrated at Merion Tribute House in Merion Station. “We had a band called the Last Exit, which was kind of ironic,” said Kathy.

The two drove Kathy’s green Volkswagen Beetle to Florida for a weeklong Disney World honeymoon.

The couple settled in Drexel Hill, but not for long. Jim, who is now 77, spent his career in property and casualty insurance. A manager, he worked for many different companies, and early in their marriage, he was transferred frequently. Kathy, who is now 73, was working for the Postal Inspection Service. She found a new job and a new college for night classes wherever they moved.

First was Baltimore — Kathy worked in Washington. Then came Laurel, Md., and their first two children, Terri and Scott. Kathy left the workforce to care for their babies. Next came Chester, N.J., and then — when Kathy was eight months pregnant with their youngest, John — Buffalo, N.Y.

When she went into labor, “I had to ask a stranger, a neighbor I hardly knew, to watch my kids,” Kathy remembers.

In 1982, they returned to the Philadelphia area for good, moving first to Drexel Hill and eventually to Garnet Valley, where the couple still lives.

When their kids grew more independent, Kathy took a job at Villanova. She spent 25 years at the University Career Center, helping students and staff use the technology, maintaining the center’s website, and compiling stats on university graduates. She herself enrolled at Villanova — her seventh college, and the one from which she graduated with a liberal arts degree and a business minor in 1998.

Their kids love sports as much as Jim and Kathy. They swam at the club where Kathy and Jim played tennis. From grade school through high school, all three participated in sports, including softball, baseball, basketball, lacrosse, and swimming. Every summer, the family went to Sea Isle for a week.

Jim retired in 2012 and Kathy, in 2016. He paints landscapes of lighthouses, barns, and older homes and builds miniature towns and villages for his model trains. She sews and embroiders gifts — baby blankets are her specialty. During the early stages of the pandemic, she made about 1,000 masks. Together, the couple hikes and plays golf and pickleball. They are also exploring the world.

The family has grown to include Terri’s fiancé, Bill, Scott’s wife, Meghan, John’s wife, Tiffany, and seven grandchildren: Caitlin, Finnegan, Patrick, Declan, Tessa, Hayden, and Casey. The Bracken clan still takes family trips down the Shore, and every other year, they travel somewhere together, including Raystown Lake in Pennsylvania and Mont-Tremblant in Canada.

In alternate years, Kathy and Jim travel as a twosome. They have been to Ireland, Italy, Hawaii, and all around Southeast Asia (alas, said Jim, his Vietnamese has grown rusty). They have taken riverboat cruises through Germany, the Czech Republic, France, Croatia, Austria, and the Netherlands.

Last May, the couple celebrated their 50th anniversary with a family trip to Scotland. “My daughter suggested, ‘Why don’t we rent a castle?’ and we all laughed about it,” said Jim. “But when I went onto Airbnb and started looking for houses that hold 15 people in Scotland, I happened to find a castle. So that’s what we did.”

“I ordered tiaras and crowns for all of us,” said Kathy. Jim made a drawing of the castle and had T-shirts made.

During the week in Scotland, each of the four smaller family units took their own day trips, then everyone gathered to compare adventures. Each group also spent time in another country before or after meeting up in Scotland — Kathy and Jim traveled the west coast of England to Land’s End.

In Scotland it stayed light outside until 11 p.m., and the grandchildren played soccer on the castle grounds.

One night, someone called up Kathy and Jim’s wedding song — the Sandpipers’ “Come Saturday Morning” — and the couple danced in front of the great room’s stone fireplace.

On their actual anniversary, Jim and Kathy had their castle to themselves. “Jim and I played golf and drank champagne,” Kathy said.

“I love that we laugh a lot and that we’re still very comfortable in each other’s company,” she said. “Life has been so good to us.”

“We kind of think alike — although not every day,” said Jim. “We’re very grateful that we have our health, three great kids, seven great-grandkids, and lots of friends. And that we have good relationships with all of our brothers and sisters that are still around. We have a very happy family.”

This summer, Kathy, Jim, and some old friends from high school will cruise around Brussels, France, and Germany on the Rhine and Mosselle Rivers.