My mother’s Polish Catholic wedding on May 3, 1952 in Detroit included some startling elements and Old World customs. She wore a pearl-encrusted tiara and a custom gown fit for a queen, held hands with her old boyfriend Richard at the reception, and issued a warning to the Blessed Mother in church after the ceremony. She relished sharing these details until she and my dad celebrated their final wedding anniversary in 2019. The stories became part of the legend of Irene.
The tiara was not a one-off. Irene created a stir at my cousin’s wedding in the early 1960s when she showed up for the reception in a black lace cocktail dress with a full tulle skirt and a sparkly rhinestone tiara that shone like a beacon in her black hair. While black outfits for weddings are common now, the look was taboo years ago. It created a tsunami of whispers throughout the hall, effectively stealing the limelight from the modestly dressed bride. Of course, that was my mother’s intent all along. It was something to witness as a 10-year-old watching from the sidelines, and triggered a lifelong aversion to the spotlight – and tiaras.
Fortunately, my grandmother exerted some sense of control and propriety on my mother’s wedding day. While the bride primped and got ready for the morning ceremony, a band – including an accordion player – serenaded her on the front porch. They played a traditional Polish song, Serdeczna Matko or Beloved Mother, which is sometimes considered the unofficial anthem of Poland. My mother and her bridesmaids, wearing rather unattractive green gowns (an admittedly deliberate choice by the bride, so no one would outshine her), headed to St. Stephens Church on Detroit’s Central Avenue. Oddly, there is no apostrophe in St. Stephens, and the church, which dated to 1917, has vanished from the “Closed Churches” archives of the Archdiocese of Detroit.
More than 500 people were invited to attend the daylong wedding, which included a huge breakfast at Dom Polski Hall on Junction, a cultural hub for Detroit Poles, following the nuptials. The band struck up again as the bride and groom headed into the hall. They were met by my grandmother, who offered the couple some slices of bread, another Polish tradition. The music and bread are meant to symbolize a happy life that is free of hunger.
The wedding party then went to Rouge Park for pictures before a nighttime dinner and reception. Another interesting bit of pictorial orchestration by my mother: she is seated in the grass, her gown billowing around her, surrounded by the bridesmaids’ bouquets – but not the bridesmaids. Center stage, once again.
It should be noted that my dad actually enjoyed retelling the story of encountering my mother holding hands with an old boyfriend at the reception. The spin my dad put on it was clever: he couched it as a personal triumph that Irene chose to marry him, not some random clarinet player she dated during World War II.
The wedding stories perfectly captured my mother’s personality and values. She was fashionable, feisty, flirty, funny and surprisingly spiritual. She always advised us to pray in Polish “because the lines are shorter.” That’s what she did after saying her wedding vows, she told me. The custom at the time was for the bride to leave a rose on St. Mary’s altar on the side of the main altar as a tribute to ensure happiness and a long marriage. My mother’s prayer was brief and to the point. “This better work,” she said in a rather menacing tone. It did, for 67 years.
Anita's Way 
Leave a comment