With great joy, the Johnson County Museum invites the public to celebrate the unveiling of its newest exhibition, “The White Wedding: A New Postwar Tradition,” beginning Saturday, May 31. This exhibit offers a glimpse into the rise of the “white wedding” tradition post-WWII, an era when love, prosperity, and consumer culture came together to create a new vision of the American wedding.  

"The White Wedding" examines how the “traditional” wedding, often considered the norm today, emerged in the 1940s and 1950s as part of a growing middle-class identity. In the wake of World War II, returning veterans and their brides, eager to begin new lives, celebrated their unions with larger, more formal weddings. This shift in American wedding culture had lasting effects on how weddings are celebrated, including emphasizing formal attire, elaborate ceremonies, and the importance of family and American values.

“This exhibit offers a unique opportunity to explore a wedding tradition we often think of as timeless, yet it only emerged after WWII. It invites visitors to reflect on how customs evolve and how they connect to the deeper story of our county’s history,” said Johnson County Museum Director Dr. Mary McMurray. “While we focus on the ‘white wedding’ tradition, we also hope to spark conversations about the many diverse wedding customs that have shaped Johnson County — and to invite donations that reflect the diversity of wedding traditions.”

Located in and around the museum’s iconic 1950s All-Electric House, the exhibit showcases an elegant collection of wedding dresses, invitations, gifts, and photographs from weddings between the late 1940s and the early 1960s. Programming is being planned to complement the exhibit, including a “Retro Housewife’s Guide to Wedding Etiquette” lunch and learn on Thursday, June 12.