Brothers and Sisters Reunited After Sixty-Seven Years

We all know that reuniting feels so good – heck, there’s even an entire song written about it. But, for Betty Schich, “good” isn’t a strong enough adjective to do the feeling justice. At least not when the reunion is sixty-seven years in the making.

Betty grew up knowing that somewhere out there she had a little brother, a boy her mom gave up for adoption shortly after his birth. Because she didn’t have the means to care for him, she decided to gift him to someone who could.

Over the years, Betty never stopped thinking about her brother and wondering if he was alive, where he lived, and what he’d become. But she never took any action to find him. What she might not have known is that he wanted to be found.

Luckily, he wasn’t against tracking down his long-lost big sister – he found her on Ancestry.com, the online genealogy service millions have used to discover the roots of their family trees. The service works with census records, death certificates, and birth certificates (as well as other documents) to educate people about their ancestors. It also provides means for living relatives to contact each other.

One day, Betty received an email from someone named Ted, someone who turned about to be the very brother she’d so often thought about. She was taken back, as most anyone would be, but she agreed to meet him. After all, he was family.

They were reunited at an airport terminal. Like a scene from a movie, it was emotional, with tears and hugs and onlookers scratching their heads and wondering what the heck was going on.

Despite not growing up together, the bond between the siblings is apparent and now, thanks to the wonders of technology and the availability of public records, they have a chance to make up for lost time.

Sixty-seven years might not seem like that long; in the grand scheme of things, it’s really just a snap of the fingers, a blink of an eye. But to put it in perspective, the last time Ted was associated with his sister, the year was 1949. Back then, gas cost seventeen cents a gallon and a new home averaged just over seven thousand dollars. That’s a good thing considering the typical yearly wage was around 3,000 a year (with a minimum wage of 70 cents). A new car was extremely affordable, too (at least by today’s stands): it costs around 1,400 dollars.

Color television had everyone’s excitement piqued – its invention was just about to take the entertainment world by storm – and the first Polaroid camera was sold, for a high price of 89.95. Harry Truman was president, as the country fought to rebound from the effects of World War II, and the National Basketball Association was in its inaugural season, one that saw the Minnesota Lakers win the championship.

Finally, George Orwell’s novel 1984 was published. One of the most beloved and popular novels, it focused on a dystopian world. In what was perhaps a preview of modern day literature, it just goes to show you that the more things change, the more they really do stay all the same.