With information provided by Sue O’Hair, Russ Patterson and Ray (Red) Gilbert*
About 1941 Probate-Common Pleas Judge J. M. Rieger, of Napoleon, had what he thought was a good idea. With military men about to leave for duty, he began to post notices as far away as Michigan that he would marry couples with no waiting period between obtaining the license and holding the ceremony. Since Michigan had a 3-day waiting period at the time, the idea was attractive to couples who lived there.
Staying open after regular hours, he issued 20,000 licenses in three years. Dallas ‘Cocky” Young was the Justice of the Peace. He married many couples after hours for an extra fee. This led to Napoleon’s reputation as a “marriage mill.’
By 1944, C. P. McClelland, president of the Judges’ Association of Ohio, termed the Napoleon wedding factory a ‘terrible disgrace,” calling for the impeachment of Judge Rieger and supporting State Representatives Kenneth Nash and George B. Marshall who were proposing a bill to shut down Judge Rieger and other counties doing the same thing.
They noted that the marriage certificates were sold for $2 — a neat profit for the judges since they cost only 10 cents. Rieger had promised to shut down his operation at one time, but quickly re-opened it. Rep. Nash noted, “It [the State of Ohio] has a duty to protect young people against those who would take advantage of the impetuousness of youth for financial gain.”
Not everyone felt that the “marriage mill’ was a bad idea, though, as told by Willard D. Thompson who was originally from Warren, Ohio, and who married Marjorie Odell from Rochester, New York. His daughter, Sue OHair recently contacted our society to find a 1941 marriage record for her parents. Having met Marjorie while they were students at Hiram College in Ohio, Willard had joined the army in 1940. In his words:
“During the Spring I had been trying to save up some of my money, and I had saved up 45 days of furlough time, so that in May I could get married. Marge and her folks had arranged things at the church and were in process of getting things arranged for a mid-May wedding, and I was going to take the entire month of May for the wedding. However, an order came out on the bulletin board [in Fair Haven, Ml) sometime after the 15th of April, that no leave would be permitted in excess of one day between then and September.
“I communicated it to Marge in Rochester and she said she would come out there and we would get married anyway. This made for all sorts of interesting situations in that Michigan required a waiting time, blood tests, and so forth. Somewhere along the way I had found the card of one Dallas Young, Justice of the Peace, Napoleon, OH, in which he advertised his office hours through the week including Sundays, and that he was available to perform marriages. We settled on Sunday, May 4th, as the time to go down and see him.
“Marge and her folks came by train, then we drove separately and met at the courthouse in Napoleon where Justice Young had his office. My folks came up from Ohio, bringing my grandparents and Alice [friend]. However, when we went into the courthouse there was a note on the door saying that the church was having its Strawberry Festival and there would be no afternoon office hours, but evening hours would still be held.
“Ray [friend], Marge and I investigated a barge canal south of Napoleon. (There was a path laid out and a park.) We spent a pleasant spring afternoon hiking along that tow trail. At 7:00 we were waiting at the Courthouse when the clerk came in to start making our marriage license and we were the first ones to be called. (As we were ushered to Justice Young’s desk) we heard a noise and turned around. My folks had stayed behind and had been hiding behind the door when we came into the office.
‘So Dad, Alice, and Grandfather and Grandmother Thompson were present for the wedding. They saw that the job was done right. The ceremonies didn’t take long and the folks headed back for Warren. Ray, Marge and I headed back toward Fair Haven. I can’t recall where, but somewhere on the way back up we stopped for pie and ice cream.”
*Russ Patterson worked at the Shaff Drug Store and ‘Red” Gilbert was part owner of the Gilbert & Herr Drug Store, which was diagonally across from the Courthouse where the Greyhound Bus stopped. Gilbert was also a ‘registrar,” who certified some public records. Russ Patterson remembers saving a newspaper with a story about this (from which much information was derived) even though J.P. Young tried to buy all of them. This was ca. 1944.
