Eddie & Sarah
Eddie and Sarah Bowles met each other in New Orleans and got married on March 27th, 1911. When Eddie and Sarah got together, she was seven years younger than Eddie. Sarah had an unknown disease that made her anxious and not so steady on her feet, but she had been this way since birth.
In order to find more stable work to financially take care of Sarah and him, Eddie moved to Cedar Falls in 1914, but he went back and forth from New Orleans to visit Sarah. “I came here as a citizen, and I want to die here,” is what Eddie said when he mentioned his relatives wanted him to move down to Texas to live there instead of Cedar Falls. Sarah didn’t move up with him initially, and the people of Cedar Falls raised enough money to bring her to Cedar Falls from New Orleans. Eddie was surprised by her arrival to Cedar Falls since he didn’t know that they raised the money to bring her. They lived in a one room home in the wooded area north of the Cedar River close to downtown in Cedar City together.
While Eddie loved to talk about his stories and entertain people, Sarah didn’t talk as much as Eddie. She says, “His tongue runs like a bell clapper.” Even though Eddie wanted to travel more for work, he would rather stay with Sarah at home more often than not to take care of her like he promised her father before they got married. Both of them were also religious and believed in the love that God provided them.
The Bowles' Marriage
Since Sarah and Eddie have been together so long, Eddie developed many views on marriage as a concept. In an interview he says, “When people say, ‘We marry because we love each other.’ It’ll last for six weeks, then it’ll be gone.” He lets out a small chuckle and continues to say, “Your families have to know what your intentions are like how you came to love the person you do. You have to explain that.”
Eddie and Sarah shared 73 years of marriage before Eddie died on October 3rd, 1984. A few years later, Sarah died in the Windsor Care Center due to complications of old age in January of 1987. They are buried together at Cedar Valley Memorial Gardens.