Religion can be a hot topic for a lot of people, but not for Mike and Carol Hill. 

The pair both went to WSU in 1969, where they both attended the Church of Christ here in Pullman. 

Mike said he knew of Carol from church, but only through Carol’s brother, Bruce. 

Mike said he did not stay long after Sunday sermons, because he lived in the dormitories at the time, and they stopped serving food soon after the sermons would end. That being said, he never had the chance to talk to Carol at church. 

“I was walking to class very early in the second semester of 1973. I bumped into this girl, and she said she had to introduce herself. She said ‘hi, you know my brother Bruce, we go to the same church, and we are in the same class,’” he said. “That’s how I met my wife. She met me. It was all on her.” 

Mike said he could not believe a lady like Carol would suddenly walk out of nowhere and into his life, and this was just the start of their journey together. 

Carol, Mike’s wife, said for the first date they went to the movie theater in downtown Pullman, where they watched a Walt Disney movie, the name of which they can not remember. 

“We talked and hit it off. The way our beliefs and values and lifestyles really meshed,” she said. “It was a blessing from the Lord.”

Mike said he remembers sitting at the Compton Union Building until closing, laughing and talking together for hours.

Pullman and the WSU community are really what brought them together, he said. 

“[The Church of Christ] was a great home base for both of us. And then in marriage,” Mike said. “For two young kids that got married, it was a great place.” 

Carol and Mike have been married for 49 years, and even though they live in California now, Carol said they still incorporate their love for WSU into their lives. 

Two of the couple’s sons attended WSU as well, keeping up with the family tradition, she said. 

“We have pictures of everybody with their Cougar t-shirts on, that’s always been kind of fun,” Carol said.