As I have stated earlier, DeVonne and I first became aware of each other in a typing class at Colton Union High School. I was a Senior and she was a Freshman. At that point we finally were informally introduced at the Study Hall dances held after school once a week. I asked for a dance and we found we could dance well together and that was the beginning. When I went away to Stanford in September of 1935, some 400 miles to the north, I promptly forgot all about her in all my new surroundings and the excitement of College, being away from home, and on my own for the first time in my life. When I flunked out of Stanford in the Second Quarter of my Freshman year I came home a little before Christmas and started working with the hope that I could get reinstated as soon as possible. In March of 1936 I received a telephone call from DeVonne asking me to go to a dance with her. I was quite surprised, since I had not thought of her since June of 1935 and I didn't expect her to have remembered me over that period of time. She explained that it was an April Fool's dance at her church and that the girls were inviting the boys. She said she didn't know if I would still be in Colton or back at school. I hesitated for a moment and then told her that I wouldn't be going back right away and accepted the date. Later I found out that her Mother had suggested she invite me and had encouraged her to get up the nerve to ask me. After all, what is a Sophomore girl in High School doing asking a College boy for a date? We went to the dance and I danced just about every dance with DeVonne and we both had a great time. I had borrowed the Folks' car and after the dance we drove to Riverside and went to one of the favorite hangouts of the high school kids for something to eat. Then I took her home. I was very polite and didn't attempt to kiss her. Anyway, she sat clear over on the other side of the car seat about as far away as she could get from me. On about our third date I told her that I loved her and that before I was through she would love me. We spent most of the Spring and Summer together. It was still in the depression era and for the most part we took long walks together and just talked. Money was scarce and every bit that I was making at work was to go for Stanford when I got reinstated. About the only thing we could have spent money on anyway would have been a picture show or eating out. We both preferred the walks and had an enjoyable summer together. DeVonne lived not too far from Slover Mountain, which was where the Cement Plant quarried limestone to make cement. The south face of the mountain was a sheer cliff as they blasted the rock down to the quarry floor on that side. The north side was more in its natural and original state. The Lime Plant was on the North side but they only worked in the daytime and shut down completely at night, while the Cement Plant worked a 24 hour day. On at least one occasion we hiked up the north side of the mountain, probably between two and three hundred feet, to a levelled area where the Lime Plant took out their ore. There were tunnels into the side of the mountain and small ore carts on steel tracks that little burros hauled in and out of the tunnels. The burros stayed in the tunnels at night and I guess never came down off the mountain. From the vantage point of the levelled off area we could look down upon the lights of Colton (what there were) and across the valley to the lights of San Bernardino. In September of 1936 it was back to Stanford for me, as I had been reinstated, and a Junior year in high school for DeVonne. Going back to Stanford for the Fall Quarter meant I wouldn't get back to Colton for about 10 weeks. I made a special calendar that numbered the days until the quarter was over which I pasted in the back of my notebook and crossed out each day as it went past. Once a girl friend of mine at Stanford, Felker Morris, asked me what the Calendar was for as she had seen me mark off the days. She was surprised when I told her that it showed the number of days left before I would get home to see DeVonne. Ever so often I had to telephone DeVonne just to talk to her and hear her voice. Christmas vacation and Spring vacation found me at home in Colton. When school was over in June 1937 I went to work as LifeGuard at the Colton Plunge for the summer. I spent all my free time with DeVonne. Whenever I could borrow Dad's car, we would go to the beach or the mountains and spend the day together. Most of the time we still took walks. On Sundays I would go with DeVonne to her Church held at the Colton Women's Clubhouse. That summer DeVonne's family took the family car and a trailer and headed for Oregon. DeVonne's Dad had an urge to go to Oregon and live there. On the way up, the trailer hitch broke on a downhill grade outside Redding, California and the trailer went over a seventy-five foot cliff pulling the car over with it. DeVonne and Harry were riding in the trailer. The trailer was made of wood and it smashed to smithereens. When her Dad got out of the car and looked down on what was left of the trailer he wondered if anyone that had been in it was alive. Everyone was okay except DeVonne. She had a huge gash, high on her right thigh that ran internally down her leg for several inches. Some metal object had pierced her leg and then pulled out again clean. She was in the hospital for ten days. The wound left her with a large scar on her thigh and a lot of scar tissue inside her leg. Fortunately, it was high enough on her leg that it couldn't be seen when wearing a bathing suit. That was in 1937. Today's women's bathing suits would never have covered it. They hardly cover anything at all. Back to Stanford in September of 1937, I was still keeping my calendar and waiting for the time to come when I could get home to DeVonne. That winter we had some very heavy rains and flooding in most areas in the State of California. I knew from the papers how bad it was in Southern California and wanted to come home to see how things were, especially DeVonne. Mason Latteau, another swimmer, had a car and he and I decided we would drive down and check things out. He lived in Los Angeles and dropped me off somewhere in LA and I had to hitchhike to Colton. It was rough going because nearly everything was washed out. I finally made it to DeVonne's home and found her okay. Later I went over to my Folks' home. Of course Dad thought it was a dumb thing to do and so did Mason's father. In fact he made Mason leave his car home and put him and me on the train a few days later to go back to Stanford. Once I guess DeVonne was discussing with her Father what love was all about and he told her that if someone loved someone he would go through Hell and High Water, or words to that effect. DeVonne said to him: "You mean like when Dick came all the way down from Stanford to see me during the flood?" Every year our swim team would come south for meets with either UCLA and USC. I'm not sure which year it was but I came down for the meet at USC and DeVonne came in with my folks from Colton to the meet. When we first met near the poolside, with me in a wet silk swimsuit, we kissed each other which was somewhat shocking to Mother. She thought it inappropriate but she didn't realize how much we meant to each other. Christmas and Spring vacations found me home working at the Cement Plant in the Engineering office for the most part doing mechanical drafting and some surveying. I still spend most of my off hours with DeVonne, going home only to sleep and eat. When school was over in May of 1938 I worked the full summer at the Plant in the same capacity. Dad was the Electrical Engineer of the Plant and he had been there since I was five years old so I knew everyone he worked with. Carl Struckman was the Plant Engineer and he hired me. Bob Abercrombie was the plant surveyor and I held the rod for him most of the time. Though I had a Quarter of surveying at Stanford I learned a lot more about it from Bob than I ever did at Stanford. DeVonne's cousin, Leland, lived in San Diego and was getting married in May and DeVonne's parents wanted to go to the wedding. They took DeVonne and me along and after the wedding we went across the border into Tijuana, Mexico to do some sight seeing. DeVonne's parents and we split up, agreeing to meet back near the border later. As DeVonne and I strolled around Tijuana we saw several shops advertising they would perform marriages. After we had seen a few we decided we ought to get married then and there. And so we did, on 28 May 1938. We had asked DeVonne's Mother in the past what she would think if we got married and she never took us seriously and always gave some excuse, like being too young, etc. I knew better than to ask my Folks as I knew what kind of answer I would get, especially from Dad. So we said nothing about it to anyone and kept it our secret. The Summer wore on and as September approached and it would soon be time for me to return to Stanford, we realized that DeVonne was pregnant and we began to make plans for our future, not knowing exactly what we were going to do. I had earned about three hundred dollars during the summer, all of which was in a checking account in a Colton Bank. I borrowed my folk's car one day letting them think DeVonne and I would spend the day at the beach. Instead we drove into Los Angeles and looked for a car. We ended up buying a Model "A" Ford and I drove it home while DeVonne drove the folk's car back. We put the Ford in storage in a garage in San Bernardino for a week until it was time for me to leave for school. A day or two later we went down to the Colton Library and each composed a letter to our respective parents, telling them of our marriage and that we couldn't go on without each other so we had decided to take off on our own. We told them not to worry about us, that we could take care of ourselves, though neither of us were sure just what we were going to do. The night before I was to leave for Stanford I packed my bags as usual and left them in the bedroom. DeVonne, at the same time was surreptitiously gathering her things together without her mother or her sisters noticing anything going on. After dark I went over to the garage and brought the Ford around and parked it a block away from our house. Somewhere around midnight I put my bags out the bedroom window, after placing my letter to the folks in the coffee can in the kitchen, and went around the house, picked up my bags and jumped in the Ford and took off for DeVonne's. I drove into the alley behind their house and she was all ready to go. Harry, DeVonne's brother, came home about that time from a date and saw us loading DeVonne's things in the car and of course we had to bring him into our confidence. He helped us load the car and swore to keep our secret until morning. DeVonne left her letter in a box of cereal. By that time we had decided to head north for Stanford as I still had a trunk full of things there and I figured I could find some kind of work in the area. We drove all night and reached Daly City, between Stanford and San Francisco, and found a motel to spend the night. The next day I drove down to Stanford and looked for my roommate, Al Horn. When I finally found him he had a telegram addressed to me in Al's care from Dad that read: "Keep on at Stanford, Love to you both." As I have thought about that telegram over the years I realize how rough it must have been on Dad to think that I was going to throw away my college education and how great it was of him, after he had taken time to cool down, to give us his blessing and tell us to keep on at Stanford. I went back and picked up DeVonne at the motel and we drove down to Stanford, both of us elated. We found a small house out in the east end of Palo Alto. A living room, kitchen and bath. The living room served as a bedroom with a fold up bed, and doubled for our dining room when we ate. We bought one saucepan, two bowls and two dinner plates. DeVonne had brought a silver service for six that she had conned her Mother out of. DeVonne has always been conservative and she was especially then. We advised Dad that we could get by on $75.00 per month and we did. We ate lots of pancakes in those days. Our house was a little place at 2555 Waverley Street on the property of the Schoenauers, who lived on the place in their house. They had a big water tank and their own well that furnished all our water. Mr. Schoenauer used to tell us that was why he could rent to us so cheap, because of water. The problem was that the water was "hard" and we didn't like that. About a month after we had returned to Stanford, DeVonne's parents came to visit us and her Mother stayed with us for a week or two while her Father drove on up to Oregon to check on some property there and then returned to pick up her Mother and head back home. They also brought along DeVonne's cedar hope chest that we didn't have room for in the Ford. In addition, they had held a post elopement shower for DeVonne and had loaded the chest with many items that the local church group had given her. Even more than could fit into the chest. All of it helped a great deal in making our lives more pleasant. At the end of the Fall Quarter we moved closer into town to a little house on the back of the lot at 745 Homer Avenue. The house was tiny but it was still an improvement over our first one, and it would be better for us when the baby arrived. When it came time for DeVonne to see a Doctor about our coming baby, we contacted a local Doctor who said his fee would be $75.00. I told him that was too much under our circumstances and he said: "Well, your wife is going to have a baby and that is the price." We told him we would try elsewhere. We found another Doctor, a Doctor Liston, who gave us the same price, $75.00, but when we said it was too much he said: "Okay we'll make it $50.00 and I'll make it up on the next person." After accepting that offer I went to the Health Department at Stanford and asked them if they knew a Dr. Liston and they said he was the best in town. DeVonne really liked him and I had confidence in him too. Our oldest son, Richard Lionel Clarke, was born in the Stanford Hospital on the Stanford Campus on 5 April 1939. Dicky weighed in at eight pounds and two ounces. He had a full head of fiery red hair that was a good inch long. All the nurses were wild about him. I came back from class in the afternoon to see DeVonne and the new baby and then went swimming. I set a record for a 25 yard sprint that afternoon and it, and our new baby, were written up in the Stanford Daily. When we returned to Colton for my summer job at the Cement Plant we lived at 1128 North 8th Street in a house that had been converted into apartments. For my last two quarters at Stanford, Fall of 1939 and Winter of 1940, we lived in an apartment house at 820 Cowper Street that was still close in town. One of our neighbors in the apartment complex was the daughter of Harry Maloney, who was the Stanford Intramural Coach.