It began 60-odd years ago as they walked to K-Springs church together, W. J. and Freddie Ferguson told me.

“There would be a road full of us walking, and Freddie and I got to walking together,” W. J. said. “I already had a pretty sweetheart, but Freddie never had any serious competition, because I knew for some reason that if I ever wanted a woman in my life, she would be the one.”

And for 60 years Freddie has been the woman in his life. Freddie Kendrick and W.J. Ferguson were married March 18, 1949, soon after his discharge from the marines at the end of WW II.

Working at various odd jobs, Ferguson attended electrician school under the G.I. bill, while his wife worked at TCI’s Tin Mill and taught school. In 1960 he went to work at the Alabama Power Company plant in Wilsonville as a coal equipment operator’s helper. But after shoveling coal for a short while he moved up to electrician apprentice then to electrician.

“That company had the first rotary coal dump,” Ferguson said. And he saw its first trial run. Ferguson retired from Alabama Power in 1991.

The Ferguson’s enjoy camping and gardening.

“While he was working long hours I did most of the gardening myself,” Freddie said. “I did the tilling, too.”

While visiting on their front porch a few days ago I noticed they have already plowed up a garden spot for this year, and have tomato seed planted in cups on a sunny side of the porch.

“But church has always been our most important thing,” Freddie said.

For many years, she taught a children’s Sunday School class and sang in the choir while her husband served as church treasurer, chairman of the cemetery committee and general “fix-it” man.

“He’s been kidded about going over to the church and breaking things just so he could fix them,” Freddie laughed.

After living for most of their lives in the K-Springs community where they grew up, and raising their children Rick Ferguson and Jan McGuire here, the couple now enjoy watching their ten-year-old granddaughter Jessica Ferguson grow up at K-Springs.