Charla Ann told me that she was by dad’s visiting when the door bell rang and she and tresh went to the door. She was standing back in the beginning listening to the man at the door asking if the people who lived there had been living there for many years. This got Charla’s curiosity up even further. At one point the man started to give a little of his background and why he was asking. He said his dad had died recently and he was home for that reason. Then he shared that he is now a Christian and something had bothered him for years and he was stopping to ask for forgiveness and return something. He told them that he had graduated in 1974 and when he was 16 years old, he had broken into mom and dad’s house. He said this had haunted him for years and he was returning the one item he had taken, a one dollar bill.
Charla noticed that someone was sitting in the car waiting on the man to return. Of course, he was having a difficult time sharing what he had done, and I got the impression that he asked more than once for forgiveness. Charla and Tresh soon was trying to reassure the gentleman that it was good what he was there for and both mom and dad no doubt would want him to know that he was forgiven. He had taken but one thing, a dollar bill. At some point, he handed Charla the original dollar bill that was never spent and was still there at his parents’ home after all these years (42) . After the hugs were given, he left and Charla started in to tell dad the story. Charla looked down at some point and realized there were several names written on the dollar bill. At the time she did not remember the dollar bill and the meaning of the names. She found dad sitting in a chair in the rec room and started telling him the story. She told me that when she handed dad the dollar that she saw him start having tears coming down his face. Dad shared with her that this dollar with the names was a dollar that his B 17 flight crew in WWII had all signed their names and he had sent back to mom. It seems that all on the flight crew had taken a dollar bill and the crew would sign them to send back to their wives or sweet hearts. Dad’s crew had been shot down twice while serving over seas and no doubt they were all very aware they might not be coming home.
Mom had evidently kept it in a drawer by her bed for years. I don’t know if anyone was aware the house had been broken into at that time. My guess is that maybe mom and dad had thought one of the grandkids had taken it to buy something maybe from the ice cream truck. This man, who had been haunted all these years for his “crime” had no idea the gift he gave my dad a couple of days ago. My dad , as far as we know, is the only survivor of that flight Crewe. Charla and Tresh were so caught up with the man struggling to ask “forgiveness, they both do not remember his name. We’ve been trying to check recent obituaries from the Security area, since dad and all would want very much for him to know what he had done by walking up to our door. After mom dying almost a year ago and Mother’s day coming up so soon, we the children all can say thank you to him once again if we knew his name. It’s nice to see and feel dad’s and mom’s love for each other in their youth even before we kids were born. Maybe God knew that we all needed this gift. Bruce