The Power of Nicknames
by Katherine Pyle Meyer
My e-mail address is chattiekathie@webtv.net
and I live in Tucson, Arizona.
I live just outside the
city of Tucson, Arizona. I'm not able to get to libraries, college
campuses and other places for researching genealogy due to physical
restraints.
For Christmas my son got me a WebTV unit and joked that I
probobly wouldn't find it to be very helpful, but he could not afford a
"real" computer. In January, I began learning the functions of the WebTV.
And by mid-February, I created a crude website for installing data about my
family.
In March, I was posting to boards and subscribed to a couple of
mail lists. The last week of March I responded to an inguiry which
iminated from one of my posts. It turned out to be a cousin, unknown to
me. This occured again within a few days of the first one. By Easter, I
was in contact with three cousins working on our family genealogy.
A few
days ago one of these cousins, whom I've never met, called and during our
conversation it was learned that my brother, whom I lost track of in
1984, was her neighbor. I called the number she gave me and, indeed, it
was him.
What is amazing about this is that he is, in fact, a half
brother and we don't share the same surname. My cousin works in the town
library, where she first recalls seeing his name (which is Edwin, but
listed as "Buddy") and when I reffered to my brother by his nickname, she
remembered it.
Boy am I happy I used his nickname!
Submitted: Sun Apr 18 07:12:14 1999
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