Father and Daughter - Serendipity

This picture I find particularly poignant.  It is of my mother, Elsie, looking at her father's tombstone taken in September of 2008.  Her father was William Phillip Roesch. Unfortunately, her parents divorced after ten years of marriage when she was eight-years-old.  Her mother, Florence, remarried Scott Hilligoss in April of 1944 when Elsie was 15.

It was two years earlier, March of 2006, when I went looking for his stone; to see the grandfather I never knew.  Once discovered, I was surprised at my reaction, a feeling of such anger and hurt came over me and I asked him quite sternly "Why didn't you care?" (About me, the granddaughter you never knew.)  I had a grandfather I loved, my step-grandfather, Scott, the only grandfather I knew, and he loved me.  

I believe William heard me and he set out to answer that question.  I felt my grandfather leading me to the answers. Amazing pieces of evidence seemed to find their way to my hands.  I discovered that yes, he did indeed care, so very much.

The door to the Roesch family had been opened and each member of the family beckoned unto me.  This was how my genealogy passion began that led to me writing "Forever Laced".