Goshen mayor saves wedding with suit substitute

Jun. 19—GOSHEN — Goshen Mayor Jeremy Stutsman is no stranger to receiving calls for help from the public.

Yet of all the calls he's taken during his years in the mayor's seat, being asked to help save a local wedding may just take the cake.

According to Elaine McCann, wedding coordinator for First United Methodist Church in downtown Goshen, that call actually came the morning of Saturday, June 12, just hours before Goshen native Liz Rieth, daughter of Bill and Karla Rieth, was set to walk down the aisle with her fiancé, Jesse Lykins.

"So, it was Saturday morning, and I was actually out in front of the church getting things ready, and one of the groomsmen came up to me and said, 'Hey, you know how you're not supposed to have emergencies before a wedding? ... Well, we've got one,'" McCann recalled of that fateful morning. "And basically what happened was, he's from North Carolina, and he's colorblind, and didn't realize his suit was gray and all the others were blue until all the groomsmen got together, and they said one of these things is not like the others, and he came to me in a panic."

That panicked groomsman was Luke Stowers, a 22-year-old, 6'4", Raleigh, North Carolina native and best friend to the groom.

"So, it's the morning of the wedding, they're getting married at 3 p.m., so the pictures are at noon, and we're supposed to get to the church at 10 a.m. And so as I'm walking out of my Airbnb, and I'm carrying the suit, my friend just looks at me, and goes, 'Hey buddy?' And I was like, 'Yeah?' And he's like ... 'You got the wrong color suit,'" Stowers said, the shock of the moment still evident in his voice. "And at first, I was like, 'OK, funny joke man. Funny joke.' Like, haha, you're messing with me. And then he unzips his luggage, and his suit was a completely different color. Mine was like dark gray with some blue, and all of theirs were like kind of a bright navy blue. So, it just doesn't work, I look ridiculous, and I start freaking out.

"I remember just being like, there's no solution, and I don't know what to do," he added of the moment. "So, we get to the venue, and I feel like a garbage friend. Like, I feel awful about it. My stomach is wrenched. I just feel like the worst person ever."

Yet at that point in the pre-nuptials, it's just the groomsmen who are aware of the suit debacle. And according to Stowers, they were determined to keep it that way.

"We're like, 'OK, we can probably find a solution. We don't need to tell anybody. Nobody has to know,'" he said of the hijinks that were about to ensue. "So, I asked the wedding planner if there was a Macy's nearby, because that's where I got the suit, and the nearest one is like super far away, and probably wouldn't even have the suit in my size. So, we were like, 'What do we do?' And the only solution we could think of was like to either put me at the end, or switch me out with the ring-bearer, which would have sucked, because I've been best friends with this guy since I was like two years old."

Desperate for ideas, Stowers looked to McCann, who immediately sets out to find a solution.

And that solution, it turns out, would be none other than Mayor Jeremy Stutsman.

"It was actually kind of funny, because I'm friends with Jeremy and his wife, Maija, and we'd just had a funny exchange on Facebook a couple days earlier about Jeremy tooling to work on his scooter in a three-piece suit," McCann said of Stutsman. "And I think that's where it was kind of embedded in my brain already, because I needed someone that was 6'4", and wears suits, and only one person came to mind. And I knew if Jeremy had a suit that he could share, I knew that he would do it."

So, with no other obvious options, McCann made the call, and low and behold, not only did the mayor pick up, but he happened to be right down the street at Goshen City Hall catching up on some work emails.

"So, he runs over to the church, we compare sizes, and he's like, 'Oh yeah, I think I've got a suit like that,'" Stowers recalled with a laugh. "So, he heads home, comes back like 15 minutes later with the suit, and it's perfect. Not only does the suit match the color perfectly, but it fits perfectly. ... A lot of people aren't 6'4", and like, I'm relatively skinny. So, it's hard to find someone with my frame. And he just happened to have it. So, he loaned me the suit, and it just worked out. I couldn't believe it. I mean, no one noticed. None of the photographers noticed. The moms didn't notice. The bride didn't notice. No one noticed. So, we got away with it perfectly. It literally felt like something out of a movie."

Even a week later, McCann said she still can't believe how everything just seemed to fall into place, as if it were meant to be.

"It was just absolutely one of the coolest things ever," McCann said of the memory. "And Jeremy is just a great guy, and I love Maija. So, it was very gracious of them."

Stowers was quick to agree.

"It was crazy," he said of Stutsman's generosity. "I mean, I don't know why he would do that. I'm just some random guy. Also, I'd done nothing since I got to Goshen except relentlessly make fun of the town, and then the mayor is just like this really stand-up guy who went way out of his way, and just let some random guy wear his suit. ... So, it was just really cool. It was just a really nice thing for him to do."

As for Stutsman, while he was happy to have been able to play a part in the day's success, he admits the call was definitely one of the strangest he's ever received, mayor or otherwise.

"I definitely never thought I'd be loaning a suit to a stranger for a wedding," Stutsman said with a laugh. "But it was kind of funny, because I know Elaine McCaan, she's been a good friend for years, and at the time I didn't even know it was Bill Rieth's daughter's wedding, and didn't really know anybody involved. So, I was happy to do it, and it was definitely one of the more interesting ways that I've been able to help out."