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A mystery of 18 years solved for daughter

By ERNEST HOOPER
Published January 23, 2007

It only took a phone call.

To fulfill her quest, to answer her prayers, to fill her with joy, to provide her with peace, it took only one call.

On Friday, Virginia resident Jenny Williams got a call from a man she met one evening 18 years ago on Clearwater Beach. They shared a smile, a kiss, a night and a wave goodbye the next day. Until Friday, however, the man never knew they also shared a daughter.

"I've prayed for this," Williams said Monday, her voice wavering between excitement and relief. "A child deserves to know her father. A child deserves to have two names on her birth certificate."

For years, Williams had searched for the father of her daughter Heather. She knew only that his name was "Lee," that he was tall, thin and blond and that he started work at Britt's Beachside Cafe on Clearwater Beach on New Year's Day, 1989.

It wasn't until months later after she returned to Virginia that she discovered she was pregnant. At the time she had neither the money nor the means to find Lee. So she raised Heather on her own for five years before remarrying. Chris Williams has been a wonderful father figure in Heather's life for 12 years, but Heather always wondered about her biological dad. Jenny wondered too.

So Jenny and her mother, Gretchen Stinnett, searched and scanned and pondered. They made calls, hired private detectives, scanned the Internet and flew to Florida to look through yearbooks. They even sought out the media to help tell their story, and their search was chronicled in this column in May of last year.

A lot of people called with possibilities. Once, she thought it may have been a man who was incarcerated. Three families called wondering if Lee could have been a relative who had passed away. Another mention in a December column stirred up new possibilities. None of the leads panned out until Thursday.

Then someone called with the last name of a man named Lee who worked at Britt's in 1990. That was a year after Jenny had met him, but it was worth exploring. Jenny found a number for his mother and left two voice mail messages. She didn't hear from anyone, so in the third message, she explained why she was searching.

He called her back Friday morning. Jenny took him back to New Year's Eve 1988, describing in detail how she had met her daughter's father. She answered his questions, he answered hers.

Jenny and Lee talked again on Sunday night for 45 minutes. She stressed that she isn't seeking any monetary support, but she wants Lee and Heather to have a relationship if they so choose.

The two tried to talk on Sunday night, but Heather was overcome with emotion and just started crying, Jenny said. They will try to speak by telephone again tonight, and could meet in February.

Jenny asked that I not publish Lee's last name or try to contact him until he has had some time to get comfortable with the news.

Both families still have a lot of feelings to sort out, but for now, Jenny is overjoyed.

"It's just wonderful," Jenny said. "I could give my daughter everything she wanted monetarily, and I could give her love, but this was one thing I couldn't give her."

With the mystery solved, Jenny will have more time to reflect, more time to thank God and most importantly, more time to love Heather.

That's all I'm saying.

[Last modified January 23, 2007, 05:45:11]