Jerry Mueller thought he had found his soulmate right there in his hometown of Bay City, Mich.
Her name was Jean Arndt and she was a charming beauty. They dated during high school after meeting at a church youth group gathering in the late 1940s. They loved spending time together and even won a mixed doubles bowling tournament. Jerry still has the newspaper article to prove it.
“Jerry was a lot of fun — always joking around,” Jean says.
But the jokester was getting pretty serious about Jean. “I thought our relationship was heading in the right direction,” Jerry admits.
Then the Korean War happened — a year after they both graduated from high school, Jean from Bay City Central and Jerry from T.L. Handy High. Jerry joined the Air Force and carried a picture of Jean with him. She even visited him during his training in San Antonio. They wrote to each other regularly until …
… well, until Jean just stopped.
“Not even a Dear John letter,” Jerry now says a rueful smile.
“Another fellow came into my life,” Jean says. “I dumped Jerry and I always felt guilty about that.”
Jerry got over it — sort of. He served four years in the Air Force, graduated from Michigan State, married his wife Carolyn in 1959 and spent the majority of his career as a supervisor for Bendix Energy Controls in South Bend.
Jean, meanwhile, married that other fellow — Glenn Prielipp — in 1954 and lived in such exotic places as Zurich, Switzerland, and Hong Kong because of her husband’s job with Dow Chemical. She even had the opportunity to christen a Polish ship while overseas. They eventually returned to the States and settled in Florida.
Good and fruitful lives for both of them.
Jerry and Carolyn had five children and nine grandchildren and spent their retirement years in Brissette Beach, Mich., before returning to South Bend four years ago to be near children. Jean and Glenn had three kids and three grandchildren and she immersed herself in all kinds of hobbies and volunteer work after Glenn died 12 years ago.
Did Jerry and Jean think of each other from time to time? Of course. But never did their paths cross despite being from the same hometown.
“My sister still lived in Bay City and I would occasionally ask her, ‘Have you heard anything about Jerry,’” Jean says.
“I had some friends back home who kept me informed about her,” Jerry adds.
In 2015, Jean sent Jerry a sympathy card when his sister died — a letter that came 65 years after their last correspondence.
The next year, Jerry ran into Jean’s sister at a funeral. “Tell her hello,” he said.
Then after Jerry’s wife Carolyn died in early 2020, they exchanged cards again — sympathy and thank you notes.
Time marched on.
But a few months later, Jean acted. “I looked on the internet for a phone number for a Jerry Mueller. There were three. The first one worked.”
Jerry was caught off guard when he heard a sweet voice say, “This is Jean.” He recovered, they reminisced a little and then they both hung up.
“Two or three days later, I asked myself if I had been dreaming about the call,” he says. So he called Jean back. “We talked like it was old times.”
They continued to talk and text. Some of those old feelings came back. And then May of this year — more than 70 years after they last saw each other and shared a kiss — Jerry went to Florida to see Jean.
“I was thinking how I could gracefully back out if Jean weighed 340 pounds,” he says.
But when he got a tap on the back as he waited for his luggage, he turned around to see a woman who was just a pretty as she was back in 1950. Oh, my gosh.
Cupid must have been circling on the carousel.
Fast forward to this month. Jean is up in South Bend for a visit. They look great as a couple. She will be 90 in November. Jerry will follow in December.
Yet they feel like teen-agers when they are together. Their kids seem OK with that. Where their relationship goes from here is anyone’s guess. But Jerry admits that Florida in the winter sounds pretty darn good to him. Jean will have to think about South Bend in the summer.
They will work something out. “Sometimes, the last 70 years feels like 70 days,” Jerry admits.
No “What ifs?” Only “What now?”