By 1934, 18 year old Martha was a student in Mankato studying cosmetology while living with her parents in Jamestown Township.  More than likely she attended the Mankato School of Beauty Culture located at 407 S. Front Street in Mankato.  Directories list her as a student in Mankato until 1938-1939.¹³

On June 18, 1936, Dick’s older brother Charles married Martha’s sister Florence.¹⁴  The wedding took place at Marysburg Catholic Church, Madison Lake, Minnesota.  Martha was the maid of honor for her sister.

In 1938, Martha moved to White Bear Lake to live with her sister and brother-in-law, Florence and Charles Vadnais.  At the time, they were renting the Vadnais family home at 1309 Fourth Street in White Bear Lake where Dick had been born.

Florence had her first child, Julaine, in September 1938.  Since both Florence and Charles were deaf they couldn’t hear when Julaine cried, so one way Martha helped out was by being their ears.  During this same time, Martha went to work for Oliver Thein in his beauty shop in White Bear Lake.

Dick and Martha had their first date on Thanksgiving of 1938.  Supposedly Dick was quite nicely dressed up when he came downstairs into the dining room area at his parents’ home.  This sparked someone to comment about him having a “hot date,” to which someone else responded that “he doesn’t have to go far to find one.”  Of course, Martha was also in the room.  After having dinner with Dick’s family, Martha and Dick went bowling.  It was Dick’s first, and last, first date; he had made up his mind that Martha was the one.  I assume that she thought the same of Dick.

The 1940 U.S. census shows 20 year old Richard (Dick) living with his parents and 7 of his siblings at 411 Bald Eagle Avenue, White Bear Lake.  The record states that Dick completed the 8^th grade and is a truck driver for an oil station (the station his father owns).  Dick made $480 the previous year ($40 per month) while his father, Adlore, as the owner of the station, made $2,500 the previous year (about $208 per month).¹⁵

At the time, according to White Bear Oil Company records, the pay Dick received from the company went to pay for his room and board at his parents’ home.

October 16, 1940, almost a year into World War II, Dick registered for the draft.¹⁶  Dick was just old enough to be affected by the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, which was the first peacetime conscription in United States history.  The Act required all men between the ages of 21 and 36 register with local draft boards, subsequently making them eligible to be selected by lottery to serve their country.  As it turns out, Dick’s brothers, George and Charles, as well as their first cousin, Robert William Vadnais, also registered for the draft the same day as Dick.

Dick’s draft registration card contains more information than what he entered the day he registered.   On it, recorded at the top of the card, is that he enlisted in the NG (National Guard) Army on June 6, 1941 and he was discharged on October 27, 1945.

Upon enlisting in the National Guard, Dick became a member of the Headquarters Battery for the 101^st Coast Artillery Brigade (C. A.) which focused on training and mobilization planning for harbor and antiaircraft defenses in the Great Lakes/Minnesota region. The unit was based at the National Guard Armory in White Bear Lake, which was built in 1922.  The men of the 101^st spent 2 weeks at the Armory after which they were sent to Riverside, California to serve out the 1 year of their initial enlistment.  After the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the one-year enlistment turned into years as the United States entered WWII and the National Guard was federalized.  Some of the men were sent overseas while others, like Dick, stayed in California providing antiaircraft protection.

According to the White Bear Press “Local News” in February 1942, Martha, along with Dick’s first cousin Delores Bloom (future wife of Earl Kulkey and sister of Howard P. Bloom) and 2 other local women left for California.¹⁷  I was told that they drove there.

Delores and Earl married sometime shortly after the women arrived in California and Martha and Dick married on September 7, 1942.  Martha was 26 years old and Dick was 23 years old.  The couple were joined in marriage at the old St. Mary’s Catholic Church in San Francisco with Dick’s first cousin, Josephine Genevieve (Vadnais) and her husband Jack Ditto (Dito), standing up for them.¹⁸  Josephine and Jack lived in the San Francisco area.

The recently married couple traveled back to White Bear Lake for a visit in January of 1943.

After their marriage, Dick and Martha settled into an apartment at 512 Van Ness Avenue, one block from San Francisco City Hall in San Francisco, California.¹⁹

To be continued…

Thanks for visiting, come back soon,
Cynthia

© 2026 Copyright by Cynthia Vadnais, All Rights Reserved

---

Footnotes for Richard Andrew Vadnais and Martha Phylis Doran (Part 2 of 3) post