He finally meets his long-lost family

Using the Internet and genealogy tips, Wally Ely of Scituate has been reunited with a 94-year-old aunt he'd never met and lots of cousins in Michigan.
Wally Ely's discovery started with two faded letters in his late father's dresser drawer. But the real kicker was a surprise phone call years later.
"I think I'm related to you," a young man said nervously.

Ely recalls being "in shock, elated" after the call. It was from a cousin, and the excitement grew as more details emerged and long-lost relatives came together.

The reunion was possible because of a combination of luck, persistence, the Internet, genealogy amateurs who shared their tips and helpful librarians and town officials in several states.

The trail of discovery began in 1987, when Ely, a Scituate resident, and his wife, Florence, were closing up the house of his late father, who had died at age 76. In a back drawer, they found letters written in the 1930s that held long-sought clues to relatives.

Seventeen years later, in 2004, at age 67, Ely finally met his 90-year-old Aunt Mabel, "a sharp and funny woman," for the first time. In minutes, they were talking like old friends.

Come fall, the Elys will travel to East Lansing, Mich., for their fifth reunion with Mabel Steinbacker, 94, and her family.

Steinbacker is the only sister Ely's father, Dan, had. There were five children in the family, but after their mother died in 1917 at age 35, their father, Jesse, split the family up. He took Dan and his older brother to Pennsylvania to look for work, after first finding good adoptive homes for his daughter and two younger sons in Michigan. Jesse Ely never saw his three youngest children again.

"My father never saw his baby sister, my Aunt Mabel, after he was 6 and she was 3," Ely said. "When I finally got to meet her, I was blown away."

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