Katherine Harris marrying Texas man

Their fathers owned and ran their families’ banks. They both have a love of France. And ranching and riding horses were part of their childhoods.

Apparently, it was meant to be.

Formerly a congresswoman, the Florida secretary of state and a Longboat Key resident, Katherine Harris Ebbeson — now a resident of Sarasota — will be married this weekend in Dallas to longtime Amarillo, Texas, banker, Richard Ware II.

The ceremony will be held at the Perkins Chapel at Southern Methodist University, where Ware serves on the board of trustees.

Calling it a family affair, Harris said the wedding party will include Harris’ stepdaughter, Louise Ebbeson; Ware’s daughter and triplet sons; and his seven grandchildren. Ware is 70; Harris 59.

The pair met nearly a year ago at a gala in New York for the American Friends of Versailles. Unbeknown to them at the time, the organization’s founder, Chicago socialite Catherine Hamilton, purposely placed the two side by side. And they quickly discovered they had a lot in common.

That was March 2016. Since then, Harris and Ware have been in a courtship that has taken her many times to his hometown, Amarillo, and him to Sarasota just as often. Harris says the couple plans to live in both places.

Harris’ marriage comes three years after the suicide of her husband, Anders Ebbeson, at their bayfront home in Sarasota.

Ware is the fourth-generation president and CEO of the family’s Amarillo National Bank, 125 years in operation and the largest 100% family-owned bank in the U.S. ($3.9 billion in assets). Ware’s great-grandfather purchased the bank in 1909, and it has remained in the Ware family ever since.

Harris’ father, George W. Harris, was the longtime chairman, CEO and controlling owner of Bartow-based Citrus & Chemical Bank. After he died in 2006, the family sold the bank to Colonial Bank.