Wow what a sweet thing to do.
Yep, nice job. I can’t imagine how it must feel to get things like that back after nearly forty years.
fantastic! good work.
Well done. Seriously good karma. I’m all choked.
And wonderful that they’re still both alive, and still together. Hope you keep in touch with them.
One question though - how did you/they know about the garage sale and the attic after the duffel bag had been stolen? (Don’t shoot me down for being cynical; it’s a genuine enquiry).
Very nice. Well told and heartwarming. Good impulses all around.
Can you find the lost photographs from my childhood, now? 
… was just thinking … an Internet business that tracks down the original owners and/or relatives of things, and lets them know they’re available…
We are living in a time where the WWII vets are passing away at an alarming rate. Soon, there will be no more. As they go, so do the first hand stories of the war; so does the understanding of the damage nations can wreak on other nations. No bronze memorials can convey these experiences. No statues can replace the history lost.
One of the biggest “complaints” about young people is that they are self centered, selfish and spoiled. Thanks for doing your part to prove these people wrong.
You are a credit to young adults.
Spritle’s post reminded me that The History Channel has a show called The Veteran’s Project. This is an audio monolog by a veteran describing his experiences in WWII that is played over wartime footage. You might want to see if the man whose letters you found would like to do a video interview. THC might not want it for their program (if they did, they’d just use the audio), but I’m sure the family would like to have a copy of it.
You can use natural lighting, perhaps with a reflector to provide fill lighting, or set up studio lights if you have them or have access to them. (Lowel, Colortran and other kits fit into a large “suitcase”.) Since it probably won’t be broadcast (although as I said there might be a chance that THC or a veteran’s organization might be interested) you can shoot it on a hi-8 or DV consumer camera.
As Spritle says, we’re losing our WWII vets. A video interview would be a wonderful keepsake for the man’s family.
This is a great story!
Good job Clayton!
This is such a sweet story.
I know that **Milosarrian ** is a newspaper reporter, perhaps he can direct you to getting this story written by your local paper…this is the kind of heart warming feel good story that **you simply must share with the world **.
I lay odds that if it gets published, it will be featured eventually in People Magazine. You don’t get much more famous than that.
Being a genealogist - I found this story very touching! Good job, clayton_e!
partly-warmer and all… you might find some of these sites interesting:
Just wanted to add my congrats, and agree with everybody else. You did a GREAT THING!
You should not only write this up for a newspaper: this would be a terrific movie script! Even as I say this, I’m thinking, “Don’t feel pressured to do more.” Do more only if you would enjoy doing it.
I nominate this thread as the coolest thing I’ve read of ANY of us doing!
Dude. I wish I was as wise at 17 as you are now.
Very well done. That man could die next week for all we know - you gave him something priceless.
What a sweet thing to do! Thankyou for sharing 
The owner of the antique shop told me how she got ahold of them, somebody came in and said some relative had bought them at a moving sale where it was among a bunch of other stuff probably from the owner’s storage, stuff like old magazines and basic junk.
Newspaper’s love these stories – and you can never tell where they’ll lead. Perhaps friends of the couples’ will get back in contact with them; perhaps long-lost relatives.
A friend here found an old letter in the walls of their house when they were rehabbing it. It was written to a fiance in Norway at the turn of the century.
The story ran in the local paper. A little more research led to Norwegian newspapers, which I understand eat these stories up.
They found the story of the man. He ended up NOT marrying the fiance but another woman.
That was a wonderful thing you did!
It also reminds me of something I’ve been meaning to do. I found a Purple Heart medal in a toolbox of my grandfather’s after he passed away. It belongs to a guy named Carl C. Berry. I want to find him and return it to him or his family. I have no idea who this guy is, nor does anyone in the family.
This really touches my heart, because my mother’s brother was in WWII (captured at the Battle of Anzio and spent two years in a German POW camp). She had letters that they’d exchanged, and lent them to a high school student for a school project. He promised that he would return them within the week. Yep, you guessed it. The kid walked off the job and she never got those letters back. Since her brother had died some time ago, it broke her heart; I remember her crying.
You did a wonderful thing.
Here is a Carl Clifford Berry who was born in 1891 and was married in 1914. About the right age to win a Purple Heart in WWI (although the page doesn’t mention it).
Your best bet would probably be to contact the Bureau of Veterans Affairs, though you may start with the local VA post.
That, my friend, freaking rocks!
Go you!
That is a fantastic story.
Two and a half years ago my grandmother died. We then had to go trough mountains of personal effects, letters, correspondence, etc. We found several letters her brother (my great uncle) had written from a Royal Canadian Air Force base in England. He was the upper turret gunner in a Lancaster heavy bomber and we found his personal photo and a photo of the entire crew. In one of the letters we found, the last one he wrote, he said he was looking forward to seeing his new nephew when he returned from the war. Several weeks later his plane was shot down during a raid over Germany. Only the tail gunner survived. I visited his grave in Germany; it was an awe-inspiring sight.
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