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Sherlock's Genealogical Adventures

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My Mother Connects With Her Half Sister!

Brick Walls

Tim Firkowski

Tuesday, 07 July 2015

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GREAT NEWS! My mother has finally been able to connect with family from her biological father!

It had been a while since I have made a post, but that's what happens when you are busy. I had to take some time to write this Blog Post as a follow up to my success in locating information on my biological grandfather. You can read my previous posts documenting the process I used to solve this mystery. Start with the old posts first.

After I located information on my biological grandfather, I had been able to locate information on my mother's half siblings and had some contact information. My mother had requested that I do not initiate contact. She said that if someday someone from her biological father's family initiated contact, then she had no problem with connecting with them.

It was just a week before Memorial Day weekend and I had a friend request on Facebook from someone named Maria Flirt. We had no friends in common and I almost ignored the request, but I looked at the name again and thought I recognized the name. I went to her FB profile and saw she was from Georgia with friends with the surname Bond, and realized that she was my mother's half sister. I accepted her friend request and a message came in. Maria (My new Aunt) had found my Blog Posts about my research into my biological grandfather and realized that she may be my mother's half sister. Her mind was racing with this new revelation and was excited to make contact. She left me her telephone number and email address so we could connect to talk about it and she could learn more about my mother.

I was soooooo excited!!! This was the culmination of a huge amount of work to solve this mystery and the conclusion was in sight. Of course I immediately contacted my mother to give her the big news, but I was unsure how she was going to react. As it turned out, she was very excited. My mother had not expected that contact would be made in her lifetime, when in reality it took only a little over a year. This would have never happened without the Internet and Social Media.

Maria and I arranged a time to chat on the phone and had a wonderful conversation. Questions were asked and answered as we began the process of learning more about each others family. Maria told me that when she found my Blog Posts she was stunned and her daughter (my new cousin) had stopped at her house and she had her daughter look at the computer screen to confirm what she was seeing and her daughter agreed that her mother had another sister. It was quite obvious that there was excitment on both ends of the phone. So many questions and so much information to absorb.

Because of the upcoming Memorial Day holiday, everyone on all sides were busy, so further communication would be delayed for a bit. A few days later Maria, my mother and I set up a time and had a 3-way phone conversation together. My mother was talking to her sister for the first time!!!! :)

There is more to this story, but because so much has happened in such a short period of time, I am going to continue this story in other Blog Posts. STAY TUNED!

Tags:

WWII William D. Bond Navy Georgia FTDNA Family Tree DNA DNA Autosomal DNA atDNA

About the author

Tim Firkowski

I have been doing genealogy research since 2002 & have worked full time as a Professional Genealogist since 2008. I specialize in Polish and American-Canadian Genealogy. As a member of APG, I was the 2010/2011 President of the New England Chapter of the Association of Professional Genealogists (NEAPG). I have Certificates of Completion for studies in "Foundations of Forensic Genealogy" and "Advanced Forensic Genealogy Techniques". I have been a volunteer librarian at the local Family History Center, and a genealogy research consultant at “Ask the Expert” Ancestry Road Shows. I have traveled to Poland numerous times & researched in churches and archives. At conferences and special events, you may find me dressed up in my Sherlock Holmes outfit, or my Kujawy (the folk costume from the region in Poland where my ancestors came from).