Woman Celebrates 50th Wedding Anniversary By Drinking 50-Year-Old Coors
When Diane and Ed Nesselhuf got married in 1971, they made two big vows.
The first was to love, honor and cherish each other, but the second one was a little more unusual: to drink a can of Coors they bought on their honeymoon on their 50th wedding anniversary.
“Shortly after we got married, we went to Colorado. That’s where Ed’s family was from,” Diane, of Vermillion, South Dakota, told local station KCAU-TV.
During the trip, they picked up a souvenir can of Coors Banquet beer, which at the time had very limited distribution
“You couldn’t buy Coors anywhere but Colorado. I just remember Ed pulling it out and saying, ‘We’ll drink this at our 50th Anniversary,’” she said.
Over the years, that Coors can became a family heirloom that came with the Nesselhufs as they moved from Wisconsin to Minneapolis, British Columbia, Maryland and finally to South Dakota.
Although Ed Nesselhuf died in 2016 from lung cancer, one of his last requests was that his wife enjoy that beer with their son, Ben, on the big 5-0: Feb. 14, 2021.
“I don’t get excited about much anymore, but I was very excited to open up this beer,” Ben told the station. “I think I clarified with Mom many times that it is really OK that I open this.”
The two immortalized the anniversary imbibing on video and Diane joked, “If you never hear from us again, it’s because we have botulism.”
Luckily, that didn’t happen as you can see in the video above.
“I thought it was very tasty. I was surprised. I thought it would be full of crap, but it was good,” she said.
Coors marketing manager Stephanie Clanfield told HuffPost that “typically, the ‘enjoy by’ date for most beers is 126 days or 18 weeks.”
She added: “In the Nesselhufs’ case, it seems to have stood the test of time, as did their marriage.”
This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
