It was just before midnight on Thursday and dozens of couples were waiting on and around the steps of the Bexar County Courthouse in San Antonio. There were men in cowboy hats and suit jackets, and women in classic wedding dresses and veils.

They were there to get married.

At 12:01 a.m. on Valentine's Day, the county clerk, Lucy Adama-Clark, began to officiate a brief, collective ceremony. At its conclusion, 125 couples kissed for the first time as married partners to cheers from friends and relatives.

Then, to the sound of “At Last” by Etta James, the couples took their collective first dance.

The couples were among the first who flocked to city halls across the country to get married on Valentine’s Day, which held special appeal this year as it fell on a Friday.

“It was a really good experience to be there with everyone else and just be surrounded by a bunch of people who are also in love,” said Nadia Martin, 29, who married Callaway Jones, 27, at the group wedding around midnight.