Last year, Jake and Mary Jacobs joyfully celebrated 70 years of marriage, overcoming numerous challenges to reach this remarkable milestone. In the 1940s in Britain, when Mary, a White woman, met Jake, a Black man, they faced a scarcity of Black residents in their city. Despite the difficulties, Mary chose love and remained committed, even when her father disapproved and told her to leave.
“When I informed my father about my decision to marry Jake, he declared, ‘If you marry that man, you will never set foot in this house again.'”
The couple first crossed paths when Jake arrived from Trinidad during the war. They both attended the same technical college, where Mary was taking typing and shorthand lessons, and Jake was undergoing Air Force training. Mary, residing in Lancashire at the time, and Jake struck up a conversation, during which he impressed her with his knowledge of Shakespeare.
Subsequently, Jake and his friend invited Mary and her friend for a picnic. Unfortunately, their outing caught the attention of a lady cycling past who, taken aback to see English girls conversing with black men, reported Mary to her father. Mary’s father, shocked by the news, forbade her from seeing Jake again.
Despite the obstacles, when Jake returned to Trinidad, they maintained a correspondence. A few years later, Jake returned to the U.K. in pursuit of better job opportunities.
What was it like to be in a mixed race relationship in the 1940s and 50s? We meet Jake and Mary Jacobs who got married in 1948 pic.twitter.com/E56ZP6QLbs
— BBC Radio 2 (@BBCRadio2) October 13, 2016
Mary, at the age of 19, was taken aback when Jake surprised her with a marriage proposal, to which she gladly agreed. However, when she shared the news with her family, they disowned her.
“I left with only one small suitcase to my name. No family members attended our registry office wedding in 1948,” Mary recounted. She expressed that while her father was ‘horrified’ at the idea of her marrying a black man, she hadn’t realized that society at large shared similar sentiments.
The initial years of their marriage, spent in Birmingham, proved challenging. Mary recalled, “It was hell — I cried every day and barely ate. No one would speak to us, we couldn’t find anywhere to live because no one would rent to a black man, and we had no money.”
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Even strolling down the street together proved challenging, with people pointing at them, as Mary shared with the Daily Mail. The couple experienced the joy of anticipating parenthood when Mary became pregnant, but at 8 months, she sadly gave birth to a stillborn child.
“It wasn’t related to the stress I was under, but it broke my heart, and we never had any more children,” she recounted. Despite the hardships, their lives gradually improved, with Mary advancing from a teacher to the assistant principal of a British school, and Jake securing a job with the Post Office. They made new friends, but Mary felt compelled to explain to people that her husband was black before introducing them to him.
“My father passed away when I was 30, and although we reconciled by then, he never approved of Jake,” she reflected. Today, at the ages of 84 and 89, Mary and Jake reside in the town of Solihull, just south of Birmingham, and recently marked their 70th wedding anniversary. Jake expresses no regrets but emphasizes to today’s young black individuals that they have no idea what life was like for him in 1940s Britain.
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“When I first arrived in the U.K., I faced daily abuse. I remember being on a bus, and a man rubbed his hands on my neck, saying, ‘I wanted to see if the dirt would come off.’ Back then, working in an office wasn’t an option because a black man in an office with all the white girls was deemed unsafe.”
Despite enduring numerous hardships, prejudice, and abuse, the couple remains deeply in love and harbors no regrets about their marriage, savoring over 70 years of wedded bliss. The enduring love between these two individuals has truly triumphed over adversity, serving as a genuine inspiration. I extend my heartfelt wishes to them for many more years of happiness. do not forget to share this article with your lovers!