Photo submitted Evelyn McKeown at the Penn Laurel motel in 1958.

A car skids across wet pavement through the early morning fog as a driver desperately tries to maneuver through a sudden sharp turn. Suddenly the world flips – over and over. The car tumbles down a steep hill and lands on its roof in the dense brush.

A couple wrenches open a door and emerges from the wreckage to begin the trek up the hill and back to the road.

It’s not often that this is the stuff from which happily ever after is made.

For Jim and Evelyn McKeown, it was the beginning of a journey that would result in Warren County holding a special place in their hearts. It was Sept. 15, 1958. The second day of their honeymoon. On Sept. 13, they’ll celebrate their 65th anniversary.

The McKeowns met at DePaul University in 1957, when Jim was fresh out of military service in the Korean Conflict. A year later the couple married.

They set out from the Chicago area headed for Cape Cod and stayed at a small motel about twenty minutes outside of Warren. They set out again early the next morning and, before long, they found themselves in an accident when they came upon a sharp turn while driving out of the fog.

After climbing out of the wreckage and back to the road, they flagged down a trucker, who took them to the nearest phone booth. There, they called the police, who never arrived.

“We shivered in the morning chill,” the couple recalled. “Slowly morning traffic began passing us. Suddenly a station wagon pulled up and a gentleman asked if that was our car down the mountain side. He said people were down there looking for our bodies. He drove us to Warren General Hospital. We never knew his name.”

From the hospital, they were driven to the Penn Laurel Motel.

“Where we were embraced with a warmth we will never forget. It was here that our love of Warren began,” according to the couple.

Eventually, the two would make it to Cape Cod, but not before Warren left its mark on them.

“Yes, the tragedy we had just endured would seem to be what we remember most, but it’s not,” the couple said. “What we remember most is all that the people of Warren did to make us whole again. Everywhere we went people greeted us kindly. As we sat to eat in a restaurant people would greet us and want to pay for our meal. As we walked the streets people would stop us to ask how we were doing. We eventually bought a car and said our good-byes. It is all of this that was so healing and endearing. Warren is forever etched in our minds as the town that nurtured us.”

For their 25th anniversary, the couple did return to the area to find the site of the accident had been replaced by the installation of a new highway. While in the area, they visited the motel where they stayed in 1958.

“It was now an assisted living home,” the couple said. “We told the lady at the front desk about our connection and she asked us to wait a minute. She left and returned with an elderly lady who remembered us and the accident. That was the last time we were in Warren.”

Now, 40 more years, eight children, 27 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren later, the McKeown’s still fondly remember the area.

“The people of Warren healed and blessed us,” they said. “Our life flowed on through joys, sorrows and adventures.”