
{"id":1884,"date":"2008-02-14T08:23:15","date_gmt":"2008-02-14T16:23:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2008\/02\/14\/recently-change-wardrobes-but-keep-your-valentine\/"},"modified":"2008-02-16T15:43:04","modified_gmt":"2008-02-16T23:43:04","slug":"recently-change-wardrobes-but-keep-your-valentine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2008\/02\/14\/recently-change-wardrobes-but-keep-your-valentine\/","title":{"rendered":"Recently: Change wardrobes but keep your Valentine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/02\/julian021408.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/02\/julian021408.jpg\" alt=\"Virginia and Milton Julian have laughed their way through the differences. Photo by Valarie Schwartz.\" width=\"161\" height=\"121\" align=\"left\"\/><\/a><br \/>\n<strong><em>By Valarie Schwartz<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Some of life\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s occurrences have a one-word explanation: Fate.<\/p>\n<p>That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s how Milton and Virginia Julian have looked at life since meeting one spring day in 1945 after Milton knocked on the door of his brother Ira\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s home and a delightful blonde responded. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Who are you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Virginia asked in her native Greensboro accent.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Well, who are you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton tossed back with a quickening heart. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Is Ira home?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Ira, an attorney and owner of the Kent Street Bakeries in Greensboro and Winston-Salem, was away on a business trip and had asked his reliable employee, Virginia, who was working her way through college, to manage the Winston-Salem store in his absence and stay in his home with the maid and two of his children. <\/p>\n<p>Milton, of Brockton, Mass., had just been discharged from the Army Air Force after serving for three and a half years during World War II. The youngest of five boys, he returned to Ira\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s home, where he had lived in 1935 while establishing in-state residency before receiving a degree at the University of North Carolina. His plan was to return to Chapel Hill and complete a law degree that he was two years into.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was love at first sight,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Virginia said. Milton, sitting next to her this past Monday, on his 90th birthday, nodded, then smiled, absorbed in the memory. <\/p>\n<p>Milton went back to school, but six weeks into it decided to return to the haberdashery business. He had sold shoes and socks before the war, but now he joined his brother Maurice, who had started selling to servicemen training in Chapel Hill during the war, but was now serving clientele returning to school, at Julian\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s College Shop. <\/p>\n<p>The conjugal knot was tied on Dec. 31, 1945 as Milton and Virginia were on their way to Florida. A woman by the title of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Ordinary\u00e2\u20ac\u009d married them in McIntosh County, Georgia.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Then all hell broke loose,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton said, laughing. They had married outside of their faiths, and both Jewish and Methodist families were in an uproar. <\/p>\n<p>Virginia has an answer for everything.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I immediately started having babies,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Virginia said when we were dating that she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d like to have a big family,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton said brightly. She bore seven \u00e2\u20ac\u201d five boys and two girls.<\/p>\n<p>In 1947, Milton decided he wanted his own store; nine months later, after exploring opportunities elsewhere, he opened Milton\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Clothing Cupboard, adding to what would become an era with seven men\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s clothing stores on Franklin Street.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I started out across the street,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We were sometimes not so friendly, but were mostly friendly competitors,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said of Maurice, who would later sell his store to his children, Alexander and Missy, who continue it as Julian\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s. <\/p>\n<p>Milton expanded, with stores in Atlanta, Dallas and Charlotte, totaling six. With his attention on business, Virginia kept up with the children. As their family also expanded, they outgrew every size of apartment at Glen Lennox and in 1955 moved into a contemporary home designed by George Matsumoto that they built on Ledger Lane.<\/p>\n<p>Shannon Julian, the third son, remembers those halcyon days: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was pretty neat growing up in the tiny version of Chapel Hill. When I was 10, I thought I knew almost all of the full-time residents. I always enjoyed some of the comments about Virginia. Here was this striking beauty driving around town in a baby-blue Buick Skylark convertible with a mess of kids in the back.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Virginia\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s love of horses, fox hunting and dog training served her well in raising their brood.<br \/>\nMilton closed the door at 167 E. Franklin St. for the last time in 1992 (it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s now home to Franklin Street Pizza &#038; Pasta), at age 74. He sold the Charlotte store to his son Bruce; but he continues to clothe clients, meeting them in their homes or offices, where he takes measurements and, working with a tailor, delivers the goods a week or so later. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Last week I had the pleasure of working with Dr. Charlie Nelms, getting new clothes for the chancellor of North Carolina Central University,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton said.<\/p>\n<p>Three mornings a week, the couple rises at 4:30 and arrives as the doors of the Duke Health and Fitness Center open, where they spend 75 minutes working out, followed by coffee with fellow members. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I started it in 1981 when it was a new facility,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Milton said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Virginia started six months later. Now it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been 27 years, three times a week.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>Virginia, 87, stays busy caring for four horses on property off Old N.C. 86 that she acquired in the late 1980s. A few years ago, they enlarged the smaller of two log cabins on the property, sold their house in town and moved out to the farm, up the hill from their daughter Jami and her family. <\/p>\n<p>Virginia keeps a garden through the assistance of her \u00e2\u20ac\u0153adopted son,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d David Weaver, who stops by regularly.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153They are the most wonderful people,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Weaver said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re so funny \u00e2\u20ac\u201d they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re two people with such different opinions and views \u00e2\u20ac\u201d it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s somethin\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>They laugh their way through their differences. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153In my eyes there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s no sweeter couple,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Weaver said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re extremely special.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\n<em><br \/>\nContact Valarie Schwartz at 923-3746 or valariekays@mac.com.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Valarie Schwartz Some of life\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s occurrences have a one-word explanation: Fate. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s how Milton and Virginia Julian have looked at life since meeting one spring day in 1945 after Milton knocked on the door of his brother Ira\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s home and a delightful blonde responded. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Who are you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Virginia asked in her native Greensboro accent&#8230;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","category-recently"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1884\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}