Kicking Off 2000 With Marriage

It's going to be one big New Year's Eve party - complete with wedding vows.

Thousands of couples from Philadelphia to Thailand are choosing to say their "I do's" in chorus on New Year's Eve as part of their city's celebrations to mark the new year.

Alysia Henderson will pledge her undying love to Eric Garrett, her 35-year-old beau, along with 999 other couples in Philadelphia for the $40 cost of a license. She says the mass wedding ceremony will help ease last-minute jitters.

"We wanted to make history. We were thinking about getting married anyway around this time of year," the 29-year-old Henderson said.

She downplayed the impersonal feel that might accompany reciting her vows along with hundreds of others.

"I never really wanted the fairy tale wedding that most people want, with the church and the limousine," she said. "I just wanted something simple and plain."

Philadelphia Mayor Edward G. Rendell and his wife, U.S. Circuit Court Judge Marjorie Rendell, will officiate the ceremony at the Grand Hall of the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

In Wilmington, Del., at least 75 couples have paid $30 to get married - and receive a commemorative "Millennium Marriage Certificate" - in a ceremony at a riverfront park.

Ken Boulden, Clerk of the Peace, decided to coordinate the celebration after fielding several requests to perform ceremonies at midnight on New Year's Eve.

"I've done a couple of weddings where two sisters have been married to two gentlemen. I've even had a father and his son married, but I've never been at a ceremony where this many people have been married," Boulden said.

If everything proceeds like clockwork, Boulden will declare the couples married at midnight and the sky will light up with fireworks. In another stroke of mathematical luck, the night will mark Boulden's 2000th ceremony.

"It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," said Boulden, who is single.

In Thailand, the allure of a group wedding can be attributed to economics. With the country still trying to recover from the 1997 Asian economic crisis, the Wedding Business Consultant Company is pitching the ceremony with 2,000 couples as cost-effective way to tie the knot.

For $275 per couple, organizers will arrange the ceremony. Couples, however, must provide their own refreshments and pay for a honeymoon room.

And what if you're in the mood for a little Elvis?

Dozens of couples will be married at the Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel, with owner Ron DeCar dressed in a white jumpsuit as the King of Rock 'n' Roll. DeCar will guide the couples through the ceremony until the final "I do" when an ordained minister takes over.

He said the appeal of getting married with a group of strangers is no different than hanging out in freezing weather in New York City's Times Square, waiting for a giant crystal ball to drop.

"Look at everybody who goes across the country with people they don' know and party and drink and scream their heads off," DeCar said. "How many other people are going to be able to tell their friends they got married in a mass wedding?"