Mrs. Wilbur F. Walk, Sr., 1311 Blair Avenue, Tyrone, returned home this week from Holland, Mich., where she visited with her sister, Mrs. Edgar Lytle, whom she had not seen for 26 years and whose whereabouts she did not know of until six weeks ago. She was accompanied to Holland by her daughter-in-law, Mrs. W.F. Walk, Jr.
The sisters were separated in 1918 with the death of their parents in Osceola Mills during the influenza epidemic. Mrs. Walk, then Bertha Richards, was 15 years of age and the eldest in a family of six children. Mrs. Lytle, then Betty Richards, was two years old and following the death of the parents, which occurred within four days of each other, was adopted by Mr. and Mrs. G. Whitmer. The other four children were placed in the home at Clearfield.
The Whittmer family then resided in Butler, Pa., and upon adoption of Betty promised not to locate any of her kin until she was 21 years ago age.
Two years ago, without the knowledge of Mrs. Lytle, the Whitmer family endeavored to secure a birth certificate for their adopted daughter, writing to Harrisburg and Butler. Later they wrote to the superintendent of the Children's Home in Clearfield and then learned that in 1928 a letter had been received from Mrs. Walk inquiring about her sister, Betty. The superintendent sent Mrs. Walk's address to the Whitmers together with photographs. Contact was made and the sisters exchanged correspondence.
The reunion at Holland, Mich., was a hurried one and arrangements are being made for a big family reunion in Tyrone during the Christmas season. Of the family of six children, five are living.
Source: Tyrone Daily Herald, Thursday, September 21, 1944
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