Shelly Smith
news@greenepublishing.com
Rene and Maribel Ortega are owners of the downtown shipping store located on Range St., We Pack & Mail. Recently, the Ortegas purchased a mini shed to renovate into a pretend school house for their eight-year-old daughter, Bella, as a birthday gift. An older gentleman from Live Oak sold the shed to the Ortega family. Upon having the shed delivered to them, the Ortegas found some bonus content in their shed: an old photo album containing pictures and an obituary. “The little shed had an album on the floor, open and full of dirt. Inside the album was a bunch of old pictures, a graduation picture and an obituary, said Maribel.”
Shortly after purchasing the shed and making this discovery, the Ortegas had Ken and Emerald Parsons over for dinner and showed them the photo album that was in their shed. Upon looking through the contents of the album, Emerald Greene Parsons recognized the name of the individual listed on the obituary. A Mrs. Nannette Herndon Beland, who passed away in 2002 at the age of 33 in Laucier, La., was a Madison resident earlier in her life and graduated from Madison County High School in 1986.
In addition to the obituary, a senior picture with name and graduating year was also included, belonging to Kim Adams Wiggins, who is a Madison County resident and was the step-sister of Beland. The remainder of the older pictures included within the album were primarily of Wiggins' father, Christopher John Adams. Wiggins experienced a house fire in Pinetta several years ago, and had lost this photo album many years prior to that incident through various moves. Because of this, she didn't have any photographs of her father nor older family pictures. Emerald Greene Parsons was able to find and reach out to Wiggins, and confirm that this photo album belonged to her.“I was shocked. It had been years since I had seen them.” Wiggins was able to connect with the Ortegas in their downtown store, and after many years, her family picture album was finally returned to her. “It felt great. I was so happy that we were able to give back those memories to her" said Maribel.
Wiggins now has pictures from her father during his Army days, as well as some other family photographs that she had considered long gone. A little bit of history was preserved, and because of happenstance and some luck, Wiggins has family treasures that she never thought would be recovered or returned to her.