A life together has brought them great joy

The Leyman phone rang for Phillip. It was a high school friend’s younger sister, and there was someone she wanted him to meet.

“Why not?” thought Phillip, then a Temple University junior living with his parents in Eddystone. He walked a block to the friend’s house and met Kelly Turner.

“She was a beautiful young lady, and I was smitten,” he said.

“First of all, he was a college guy — that was a plus!” said Kelly, then a senior at Notre Dame High School in Moylan. “He was quite handsome with a beautiful smile.”

Before heading home, Phillip retrieved a copy of his St. James Catholic High School senior picture from his wallet and signed the back for Kelly: “To a blonde bombshell. Good luck on all your future romances.”

Phillip planned to do the romancing. He asked her to a movie: Romeo and Juliet. Soon after, Kelly went to visit their mutual friend, Karen, then walked down the street toward Phillip’s house. He was about to drive off in his car but stopped to see what Kelly wanted. She wanted him to accompany her to Notre Dame’s Class of 1970 Ring Dance — which coincided with seniors getting their class rings. He agreed.

“Eddystone is a small town, and when my parents found out that he was taking me, they called friends of my brother’s to see if Phil was an OK guy,” Kelly said. “He got the thumbs-up.”

Eighteen months later, on Easter Sunday 1971, Phillip handed Kelly a box with a hollow chocolate egg inside.

“Open it up,” he prompted. “Look inside.”

She lifted the top half of the egg, took out a Hershey’s Kisses, and replaced the lid.

Phillip hinted harder. “Look around in there. Maybe you’ll find something.”

The Kisses concealed a diamond ring.

“Yes!” Kelly said, holding out her hand so Phil could place the ring on her finger.

On Dec. 11, 1971, the couple married at Our Lady of Peace Catholic Church in Milmont Park. A reception for more than 200 was held at the United Auto Workers Union Hall in Eddystone. “I came from a large Italian American family — cousins by the dozens — and every single one was invited,” Phillip said.

“The reception was not fancy, but we had a live band that played rock and roll, and everybody had a good time,” said Kelly.

At cake time, Kelly’s father — a wonderful joker named Joe who looked a lot like John Wayne — put his face next to the cake to watch his daughter and new son-in-law make their cut.

Kelly and Phillip exchanged a look, silently agreeing on what had to be done. “Both of us took our piece of cake and pushed it right in his face,” said Phillip.

The room roared with laughter.

The couple took a quick trip to Ocean City, N.J., then six months later, honeymooned in Jamaica.

Phillip, who is now 72, had graduated from Temple just before the wedding. He became a process engineer for AT&T and then a scientist for the Army Research Laboratory.

Kelly, who is now 69, worked at Bell Telephone until daughter Kelly-Anne was born in 1973. Brighid followed in 1975 and Anne Marie, in 1980.

The family settled in Oxford, Chester County, where Kelly and Phillip still live. When their children grew more independent, Kelly took a job as an aide in a special education classroom, and her love for the students she worked with proved to be life-changing. Her next job was in administration at Devereux Advanced Behavioral Health, which provides therapeutic, educational, and other programs for students and adults. At 40, Kelly started classes at Immaculata University and went on to earn a degree in communication.

She served as Devereux New Jersey’s director of development until she retired in 2012 to watch her oldest grandson, Reed, who is now 10, and then his brother, Phillip, now 7.

Phillip — a.k.a. Pop — retired in 2019. A board member previously for both the Oxford School District and Oxford Educational Foundation, he is a volunteer chemistry and math tutor.

The couple loves to travel locally, regionally, and internationally. They take in opera and ballet in New York, go down the Shore every summer, have hiked in the Grand Canyon, Acadia National Park, and Monument Valley, and have journeyed to Australia, Greece, Ireland, Italy, and France.

“Phil is a good man,” Kelly said. “He’s kind, he’s loving, he’s thoughtful, he’s a hard worker. And I knew that from the beginning because he was so good to his mom and dad.”

Phillip said his love for Kelly has grown through shared laughter — he delights at her enthusiastic laugh — and mutual respect. “She doesn’t make a big deal out of the little stuff, but we take each other’s input seriously,” he said. “If I have an idea or a thought about something I’d like to do, I have always talked to her about it. She’s always open to discussion. We make decisions together.”

They have faced challenges.

“The death of our parents was the most difficult thing we had to help each other through,” said Kelly.

“She was extremely close to her father, and it was very difficult for Kelly when he was diagnosed with lung cancer,” said Phillip. “He died in 1985 — he was the first one we lost.”

But mostly, things have been great.

“We had a lot of fun raising our girls, and we are very proud of them,” said Kelly. “Our three daughters have brought us great joy — and so have our two grandsons,” Phillip agreed.

The couple are members of Oxford’s Sacred Heart Church, where Kelly is a Eucharistic minister and Phillip a lector.

When the Rev. Joseph Shenosky found out their 50th anniversary was approaching, he had an idea. And so on Saturday, Dec. 11 — 50 years to the day after they wed — Kelly and Phillip renewed their vows in a special Mass. Shenosky was joined by the Rev. William Dooner, who had celebrated the Mass for their 25th anniversary.

The couple’s daughters hosted a luncheon celebration for 40 at Wyncote Golf Course. Invitations were created by Kelly-Anne Leyman Design. DJ Jay-Ski, daughter Brighid’s fiancé, played music from the ‘60s and ‘70s. Son-in-law Chris took the pictures.

The couple hopes to return to Sicily and Australia, where Phillip’s grandparents were born, to visit relatives he found through genealogy research. They also plan a trip to Enniscorthy, Ireland, the birthplace of Kelly’s grandmother.