Couple to get wedding cake 65 years after taking vows

Sixty-five years after Cliff and Jo Gillard of Bonners Ferry married, they will finally get their wedding cake.

When the Gillards married on June 1, 1943, in Bonners Ferry, the Spokane, Wash., bakery they ordered their wedding cake from never delivered it.

A few days later, while on their honeymoon in Spokane, the Gillards went to the bakery to find out what happened. Through the window, they watched as customers drank coffee and ate the couple’s wedding cake, piece by piece.

“When they saw it in the window being cut up into pieces, they walked on,” said the Gillards’ daughter, Ronnee Shineman of Camano Island, Wash.

They didn’t have the heart to go inside the bakery.

When the Gillards’ family meets for the couple’s anniversary, there will be a two-tier, white wedding cake cake, Shineman said. It will say “Cliff and Jo, June 1, 1943.”

As for the Gillards, their relationship began after Jo passed a note to Cliff between classes at Bonners Ferry High School. They started dating right after that.

At the time, a typical date would be a Saturday matinee at the Rex Theater in Bonners Ferry. Cliff would peddle his bike from Cow Creek to Jo’s house 6 miles north of town. She would then ride on the crossbar of Cliff’s bike to town and back, and then Cliff would peddle home. That was a 36-mile roundtrip for Cliff and 24 miles for Jo on that crossbar. 

The Gillards owned Kootenai Kustom Body Shop, an auto body repair shop at the current location of Oriental Gardens. They used to say that Cliff “pounded and painted” and Jo “sanded and masked.”  They were always a great team. The business was known for its quality work and their motto was: “The difficult we do at once. The impossible takes a little longer.”

They worked together side by side every day until they retired in the late 1980s.

Their marriage and love never wavered despite hard times, good times and separation during World War II. They built their home south of town where they still reside.

Today, Cliff is 83 and his wife is 86.

The Gillards’ other children are Diana Dishneau of Renton, Wash., and Tanjer Gillard of Lake Stevens, Wash. The couple’s unofficial adopted daughter is Kim Nue.

The Gillards also have three grandsons, a great-granddaughter and two great-grandsons on the way. One of the great-grandsons was due Tuesday, May 27, which means the Gillards will probably meet him at the family gathering for their anniversary.