Christmas time has always been special for John and Joan Reichart.
In December 1970, John, back home in Indianola, Iowa, after serving in the Vietnam War as a Marine, proposed to his girlfriend Joan on Christmas Eve.
After getting married, the couple decided to make every Christmas they celebrated special. Over the years, the holidays became a cherished time for the Reicharts.
“Coming out of the Great Depression and World War II when we were born, you know, people didn’t have a lot of things, so there were Christmases that we both remember not getting any gifts,” John, 74, said. “Once we married, we both decided we would go all out for Christmas since we were robbed of it when we were young.”
Recently, however, the holidays have been bittersweet for the Reicharts. In December 2020, Joan, 72, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s after going through a brutal battle with triple-negative breast cancer.
“She couldn’t catch a break,” he said. “She kept getting hit with one thing right after another.”