TORRINGTON – This Valentine’s Day, millions of couples all around the world will celebrate their adoration with flowers, chocolates and dinner dates. For a much smaller percentage, however, the holiday marks 70 years of marriage and a lifetime of love and memories shared.
Torrington residents Lewis and Grace Snyder were married Feb. 14, 1947, after dating for just seven months.
Lewis was a medic in the U.S. Army, stationed at Fort Sam Houston Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, following his service in World War II when he met Grace, a Texas native.
“Me and a buddy of mine – I think it was on a Sunday – him and I were just walking around and we ran into her and her friend,” Lewis said.
“It was at Brackenridge Park in San Antonio,” Grace said. “We got to talking and the next thing you know, we went to a show together. The next day, the supervisor in my office asked my friend about her guy and she said he was absolutely horrible. Then she asked me about (Lewis). I said he was kind of a jerk. She asked, ‘Well, are you going to see him again?’ and I
said, ‘Yes.’”
While Grace was a Texas girl, Lewis had grown up in eastern Nebraska. Before his senior year in high school, he visited Torrington to work on a farm with his brother. He returned to Nebraska to finish his schooling, but family ties and a love for Goshen County eventually brought the couple to Wyoming.
“I hated eastern Nebraska – we just liked it out here, and he had two brothers out here: Elmer and Sam,” Grace said. “I didn’t like Decatur (Nebraska) because of the humidity, and we had a chance to come out here and went to work for Everett Anderson on his farm.”
Aside from farm work, at one point the couple owned Snyder’s Grocery, Lewis worked at the Torrington Senior Friendship Center, and Grace spent 26 years at Torrington Beverage.

They had two daughters together, along with Grace’s stepdaughter.
“We have a combined seven grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and I have no idea how many great-greats,” Grace said, laughing. “They
keep multiplying.”
Even after seven decades, neither Lewis nor Grace is sure how they knew each other was “the one.”
“I don’t know, but it sure happened,” Lewis said. “We’d just meet once in awhile and …” He shrugged.
“I never went out with anyone else after I met him, and he never went with anyone after he met me,” Grace said. “It was just meant to be, I guess.”
Lewis and Grace used to try to take a vacation once a year, but lately their health has kept them from venturing too far from their home. The couple doesn’t seem to mind, though. As long as they have each other.
“We go to church, go grocery shopping – we haven’t been to a show in I don’t know how many years – but we do things like that together,” Grace said. “We’ve always done things together. Basically we never did anything separate – we always did everything together.”
As far as tips for those young couples celebrating Valentine’s Day and hoping to make it 70 more – the Snyder’s have a few.
“We talk things out and never go to bed mad at each other. That’s one thing we always worked on,” Grace said. “When you get married, you’re working for the future, not just working for tomorrow. The idea was to form a family and stay together.”
“We never had a serious argument,” Lewis said.
“We had disputes,” Grace clarified. “If we didn’t, we wouldn’t have been human.”
No matter what the secret is, the Snyder’s have maintained a lifelong appreciation for one another.
“All I can say is it was a good life,” Lewis said. “I always considered myself pretty lucky to have her.”
And for Grace, the feeling is mutual.
“We were both pretty lucky with the whole thing,” she said.