Stuart Warner and Debbie Van Tassel Warner, who once made goo-goo eyes at each other at Ol’ Blue Walls after a whirlwind romance, are celebrating their 35^th wedding anniversary today.

Stuart works fast. Or maybe it was Debbie?

Anyway, they first met on Friday night, May 22, 1982 and moved in together the following Monday.

“What a weekend,” Stuart wrote, and I believe him although it sounds like a romantic movie plotline.

By September 25, 1982 they were married.

Stuart concluded: “Love you, Deb Van Tassel Warner.”

Stuart came to the Beacon Journal after 10 years with Knight-Ridder's Lexington newspaper. He was at the BJ from 1979 until 1999.

 

He left the BJ for the PD. By the time he took a PD buyout in 2008, he was writing coach and projects editor, similar to his role at the BJ.

 

Stuart, after four years with the Arizona Republic, became editor-in-chief of the weekly Phoenix New Times in Arizona, which has gone online with some impressive investigative reporting.

Stuart authored a book, "JOCK: The Quickest Thinking Coach in America," from memories of Stu’s Kentucky days.

Stuart and wife Debbie Van Tassel, the whip-cracking department chief during her BJ days, left Cleveland for Arizona in 2013.

New Jersey native and Seton Hall graduate Debbie, at the BJ till 1999, was assistant managing editor/features at the PD before going to the Arizona Republic, where she was laid off less than a month ago despite some spectacular success there.

Another case of a newspaper picking economics over talent in this era of struggling print media.

Debbie had a hand in three Pulitzers, including at the BJ with the Goodyear greenmail sorry saga and A Question of Color; and the Boeing 737 crash in Seattle while she was working for the paper in the rainy city.

Stuart and Debbie have three daughters and four grandchildren.

The daughters:

Denise Warner, who lives in Brooklyn, is editorial director of Billboard Digital, the Bible of the music entertainment business since 1894.

Emilie Warner Clemmens and Amanda Warner Poynter both live in Lexington, Kentucky, Stuart’s old haunt, and each provided Stuart and Debbie with half their grandchildren.  Emilie has a ph.d and works for the government. Mandy is an executive with a firm that does benefits.