Floyd and Violet Hartwig had a fairytale romance, complete with a fairytale ending.
According to their daughter, Donna Scharton, the pair met in grammar school, but they didn’t reconnect until years later when Floyd was on leave from the Navy.
After they reunited at a local dance hall, they began corresponding through letters. According to Fox 2, Floyd and Violet married and had three children, four grandchildren, and eleven great-grandchildren.
The Harwigs went on to own a ranch near the town where they grew up.
And what their daughter remembers most was not only how hardworking they were on that ranch, but how they always worked side by side. She explains:
“You had a sense that they had a connection. And I think that connection came more and more, and especially in the last months of their lives.”
As the pair grew older — and their health worsened — Floyd’s affection for Violet only grew stronger.
“His main concern was my mom,” Donna recalls. “The last time we took them to the doctor he said, ‘I’m okay, I want her fixed.’”
Unfortunately, during that same visit, Floyd’s blood test showed that he had had kidney failure and only had a short time left to live. Violet’s health was failing as well, so the next week the two were put on hospice.
“They wanted to die at home and they wanted to die together, and that’s what we wanted to do for them.”
As time progressed and what looked to be the end drew close, the children did the only thing that seemed right.
They pushed their hospital beds together and enjoined their hands. Floyd died first — holding his true love’s hand — and Violet died five hours later.
“We felt blessed because we know that’s what they wanted…It was meant to be. That’s the only way it could end.”
In a remarkable tale of undying love, this couple’s story ends exactly the way it should.