I love going to a thrift store because it’s one of the places I can find rare treasures. You always go out and expect to find a needle in an ordinary haystack. We will always be happy when we find something very rare or very valuable.
In this clip, Elaine Ortiz from Westminster, Colorado finds an unexpected treasure in a thrift store. Not only did you find the furniture. This woman found a love letter hidden in an ordinary envelope. I was shocked to learn that the letter was dated December 29, 1944.
The letter was written by Bill Moore, a WWII soldier, to his lover, Bernady, at his home.
“I get emotional because it’s a love letter! And someone has to understand it. It’s not mine, someone else has to understand it,” said Ortiz at InsideEdition in 2015.
After holding it for six months, Ortiz turned to 7NEWS to locate the rightful owner.
Soon after, they locate Melina Gale, one of Bill and Bernadine Moore’s three children.
“I can’t believe Elaine found this,” Melina told CBS News. “Most of their meetings were through letters during the war.”
Melina said her parents first met when her mother was still in high school in Fredonia, Kansas.
The couple were married for 63 years until Bernadine passed away in 2010.
Bernadian retained all of Bell’s letters while serving in Patton’s Third Army in Europe.
But after Bernadine died, Bill remained in a vet-assisted nursing facility, and the letters eventually disappeared.
“Years and years. We can’t find her,” Melina told 7NEWS.
Therefore, receiving this letter from Ortiz “means everything”.
Melina said this is the only original copy we have.
A few days before Valentine’s Day in 2015, Melina went to visit her father, now 90, at a veteran’s care facility in Aurora, Colorado.
That day she brought a love letter with her to present to him
Bill was stunned and dumbfounded when he saw the message.
“I had no way of knowing it would happen like this, and it really would happen to me,”
said.
He couldn’t hold back his tears while reading the long-lost letter
Bill said, “Dear beloved, charismatic Bernadette.” “I ran out of space, but I could have written more adjectives to describe you. You are so lovable, my dear, that I often wonder how you could be mine. I truly am the man luckiest in the world, you know. You are the reason, Bernady. Even your name is sweet to me.”
Bill was only twenty when he wrote this letter to Bernadian
“I love you. I believe I will always love you.”
Bill’s love for Bernadian is so incredible that there are no words to describe it.
“I loved her and she loved me. That’s all I can tell you. It hurts my heart not to be with her all the time,” he said.
The love between Bell and Bernadine Moore is still going strong after seven decades…