When 17-year-old Chuck 'Red' Lewis saw 16-year-old Sandy 'Franci' Riggins (now Gutting) at Oceanside Pier in California, it was love at first sight.
But the pair lost contact when Gutting went home to LA, and both went on to marry and raise families in different cities.
After a silence of 62 years, the pair got back in touch via email seven years ago and found the feelings they had for each other in 1945 were still there.
Both now in their 80s, the memories of that long-ago summer are still vivid for both of them.
Chuck Lewis, 85, told UT San Diegothat when he saw pretty blond Sandy Gutting, he had to go and 'chat her up.'
'I was excited,' Gutting, 84, said.
Young love: This photo was taken shortly after Lewis and Gutting met at Oceanside Pier
'Here was this handsome guy who was interested in me, and I thought it would be fun.'
The relationship turned serious and when Gutting, returned home to Los Angeles after spring break, Lewis managed to scrounge rides from friends to visit her every weekend that summer.
But when summer was over, Lewis, still in high school, with no car, no money and having worn out his friends' generosity, couldn't visit his beloved Franci any more.
'We were involuntarily separated,' he told UT San Diego. 'It couldn't be helped.'
For Gutting, it was her first break-up, and she took it hard.
'He broke my heart,' she said, explaining how Lewis sent a friend to collect his letterman's jacket from her.
Gutting moved on, working as a flight attendant for United Airlines and marrying a man who was a passenger on one of her flights.
She had four daughters, and when her husband died of a heart attack after 17 years of marriage, she raised them alone.
Gutting eventually moved to Seattle to be close to her grown children and grandchildren.
Lewis joined the Air Force, went to UCLA and became the manager of a lock-making company.
He married twice, and his first marriage produced two daughters.
In 1990, Lewis retired to Oceanside, the town where he first laid eyes on Sandy Gutting.
Years passed, but both Lewis and Gutting occasionally found themselves remembering the sun-drenched summer when they were young and in love.
'When one dates such a lovely girl,' Lewis told UT San Diego, 'one remembers such things.'
Both treasured a small pile of photographs taken in 1945 when Franci, in a white bikini, and strapping 17-year-old Red would take beach trips and go on romantic dates.
Gutting told UT San Diego how she would show a picture of Lewis that she kept in her closet to her grown-up daughters.
'There were many times over the years where I'd think about my dear darling Franci,' Lewis said.
Despite the even greater distance between them since Gutting's move to Seattle, getting back in contact was a lot easier than it would have been in 1945.
In 2007, a mutual friend told Lewis that he had spoken to Gutting via email and discovered she would be flying to Oceanside for a friend's birthday party.
Lewis needed no further encouragement and emailed Sandy immediately. The pair struck up a correspondence, exchanging 62 years of news.
He picked Gutting up from the airport, wearing a red hat in honor of his teenage moniker, and the pair went to their old stomping ground at Oceanside Harbor for a long, conversation-filled dinner.
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