Wednesday was a typical busy day in the Orange County Clerk’s office. Brandy Robertson, the elected official in charge of the office, was manning the counter during the lunch hour. Like many people going to the office, he wanted a copy of his birth certificate.
Robertson took his driver’s license to make a copy of it, required for a birth certificate. She glanced at the city where he was from. Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. The city was stuck in her head. She had been looking for a brother she and her sisters had not seen in 24 years. The last place she had tracked him on the internet was to Beaux Bridge.
When she looked at the name, she was shocked, in a miraculous way. The man was her brother, Kenny Calder.
“I said to him ‘Is Jesse your daddy?’ He said, ‘yeah.’ and I said’ you don’t know who I am. I’m your sister,” she said.
They had a quick reunion filled with photo-taking and tears. Robertson said two of her three sisters live near the courthouse and made the quick trip to meet him. The third sister lives in Orangefield and couldn’t make it to the courthouse in time before Calder had to leave. They plan a bigger and longer reunion soon.
Robertson said Jesse Calder died in 1993 when she was 16, the oldest of the four sisters. Kenny Calder had moved to Carthage to live with his mother and was in his 20s when their father died. That was the last time the girls saw their brother.
Sometimes Robertson would look online through sites like Facebook to see if she might be able to find him. A couple of months ago, she tracked who she thought was her brother to Breaux Bridge. Wednesday, fate brought an end to the search.
-Margaret Toal, KOGT-
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