EDINBORO —
Raquel Miller of Waterford wasn’t so sure she would ever meet Mr. Right. And her mother, Renee, told her often to quit trying so hard.
“When you stop looking, that is when you are going to find Mr. Right,” Miller recalls her mother saying.
And so begins the story of how Miller and Cambridge Springs native Adam Bogda fell in love. Sort of.
In 2010, Erin Bogda decided to enter her brother, Adam, in Star 104’s Erie’s Most Eligible Bachelor contest. Bogda was one of 130-plus entries in the online contest where people vote daily for who they want to become Erie’s Most Eligible Bachelor. The winner earned an extensive prize package, he said.
Bogda did make the cut as one of the top 15 finalists, but he did not win the title of Erie’s Most Eligible Bachelor. Instead, what he won is his future wife.
During the competition, Star 104 held a meet-and-greet at Oasis Pub in Erie. Miller and her friends decided to attend “with no intentions of meeting anyone,” she said. “I just went with girlfriends, hoping to have a good time. It turned out a little different.”
“I went up, actually met Raquel there and we talked a little bit,” Bogda said. “The following weekend we met at the Bar Stool Open. We talked again and realized we knew some similar people. The following Wednesday we went on a date to an Otters game, which I won at the first mixer.
“That’s where it all started.”
Now, after that initial meeting back on Feb. 20, 2010, the couple is in the process of planning its wedding.
Bogda proposed on Christmas Eve. The couple will wed on May 18 at First United Methodist Church in Cambridge Springs.
“Everybody always asks how we met,” Miller said. “I used to always joke that I was going to go on The Bachelorette show because it was the only way I was going to meet anyone. And then that is how I met (Adam). Kind of funny.”
Bogda proposed with the help of the couple’s dog, Duke. Miller said Bogda put a red bow on Duke and tied the ring to the bow.
“I was freaking out,” Miller said. “I always thought it was funny when they used the little Cesar dog (in the dog food company’s commercials) to propose. It was cuter when Duke did it.”
Bogda said it was Miller’s similar personality that first drew him to her.
“We made each other laugh,” Bogda said. “We just clicked. It’s kind of hard to explain.”
“I wasn’t looking for anyone overly hard,” he added. “But I knew she had something special that I wanted in my life.”
And he has his sister, Erin, who ironically went on to win the title of Erie’s Most Eligible Bachelorette in 2012, to thank.
“She thinks she is the only reason we met,” Bogda said. “It’s neat. It’s something different and a story I am proud to tell.”
Bogda, a 2004 graduate of Cambridge Springs High School, is the son of Craig and Lori Bogda of Venango. He resides in Edinboro with Miller and is employed as a tool and die maker at Hytech Tool and Design in Edinboro.
Miller is the daughter of Todd and Renee Haubach. She is a 2005 graduate of Fort LeBoeuf High School and is employed at Northwest Savings Bank in Erie as a customer service representative.
Lisa Byers can be reached at 724-6370 or by email at lbyers@meadvilletribune.com.
Local News
Related Photos
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Duke, a black lab that played a pivotal role in Adam Bogda’s proposal Raquel Miller, seems uninterested as his owners share a smooch. RICHARD SAYER
Discussion
Search for Mr. Right ends in unlikely scenario
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