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Plaque marks Chicago site of Obamas’ first kiss

ASSOCIATED PRESS
A 3,000-pound granite marker sits at the corner of Dorchester and 53rd Streets where President Barack Obama first kissed first lady Michele Obama, Thursday, Aug. 16, 2012, in Chicago. The Obamas will celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary this October. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

CHICAGO >> Barack Obama first kissed the woman who would become his wife outside a Chicago ice cream shop — and now there’s a plaque to prove it.

The managers of a shopping center in the city’s Hyde Park neighborhood installed the 3,000-pound granite marker this week with a plaque reading, “On this site President Barack Obama first kissed Michelle Obama.”

The plaque includes a picture of the first couple and a quote taken from an interview the president gave to “O, The Oprah Magazine” describing their first date.

“On our first date, I treated her to the finest ice cream Baskin-Robbins had to offer, our dinner table doubling as the curb. I kissed her, and it tasted like chocolate,” the plaque reads.

The sweet smooch happened in 1989 when the president treated the first lady to ice cream at a Baskin-Robbins, which is now a Subway restaurant. The boulder sits in a flower bed next to the shopping center.

“It’s a marker for the community, for posterity and tourism, too,” said Jonelle Kearney, a spokeswoman for Mid-America Asset Management, which manages the shopping center.

The Obamas will celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary in October. They have a home in the city’s Kenwood neighborhood, not far from the shopping center.

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