Treasure hunt
Sandy man sees Lord's hand in work
But only recently — after his retirement seven years ago — has he engaged in a "treasure hunt" back through Great Britain of which he never could have dreamed.
This saga begins in 2004, when Baker received an article from an Internet friend printed in the Dumfries (Scotland) Standard. Baker's grandmother had died there in 1913 and lived in the King's Arm Hotel, and he wanted a picture of that building to put in his book of remembrance beside his grandmother's death certificate. The building now housed a pharmacy. The article, however, bore no relationship to anything Baker was looking for.
After reading the article several times, Baker felt impressed to write the Standard, requesting that the publication ask its readers if any knew of his grandmother.
"This appeared to be a ridiculous question," Baker said. "She had died some 91 years earlier. My head was saying nonsense, but my heart was saying write anyway."
On Christmas Eve 2004, Baker received an e-mail from a Margret Marshall, who turned out to be his half-sister. Margret goes by Peggy — as does their mother, who is 94 years old and living in London.
Baker was born in 1939 in London, along with a twin brother, Derek. He also had grown up with a half-brother, Ken, who was born in 1947.
Half-sister Peggy is three years older than Geoff and Derek, and their mother already had given her to a family to take care of before Geoff and Derek were born.
After Baker found his sister, he was surfing the Internet and discovered a Carol Bryan who was looking for a sister born of a Peggy Baker of London. Geoff Baker made contact.
Bryan was living in Georgia while her father was an American soldier in England during World War II. He and Peggy Baker had a daughter in 1943. By that time, Geoff Baker's father was gone, and the twins were living in a nursery.
Baker and Carol Bryan are not related, but they were both looking for the same person — a younger half-sister. Bryan eventually did get in touch with the elder Peggy Baker and confirmed there is a half-sister living in Belgium.
But the information came with a pact: No one could tell Geoff any details about the half-sister until his mother dies.
Baker believes that while he, his twin brother and their mother were baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1951 in Herfordshire, England, Derek and Peggy later became antagonistic toward the church and don't want to help him. Bryan did send Baker a picture of their half-sister after blotting out her last name.
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