Two couples in Caribou got married in an airplane 85 years ago. Here’s the video

Northeast Historic Film posted this amazing video on Vimeo a few years ago. It features, among other things:

  • An apparent wedding aboard a single-propeller airplane (there’s no sound)
  • A parade of girls pushing tricked-out baby carriages down a Caribou dirt road
  • An amazing top hat
  • An all-women marching band
  • A whole lot of pomade

The couples tied the knot on June 5, 1930, according to Northeast Historic Film.

This wedding pre-dates by roughly 80 years that 2014 ceremony aboard a Southwest Airlines flight by an Indiana couple.

Update:

Here are some more details from Candace Kanes on Maine Memory Network:

Flying was still a novelty in 1930 when two couples in Aroostook County decided to have a double aerial wedding.

Etta Olson and Roy S. Oberg of New Sweden and Frances J. Bragdon and George H. Cone of Ashland left from the Vaughn house in Caribou, traveling in flower-laden vehicles and followed by dozens of other vehicles and numerous persons as they headed to the Caribou airport on June 5, 1930.

The pilot, identified in the film, was W. Gerbrach. He took each couple and their wedding party up separately and a minister who accompanied them performed the weddings. The couples then greeted friends on the ground.

Dan MacLeod

About Dan MacLeod

Dan MacLeod is the managing editor of the Bangor Daily News. He's an Orland native who moved to Portland in 2002 and now lives in Unity. He's been a journalist since 2008, and previously worked for the New York Post and the Brooklyn Paper.