My sister had been told by her step mother that Dottye had a lot of trouble while in high school. I imagine she had heard the stories from Karen's dad, as "D" married him soon after Dottye's death.
Karen would hear what "D" would say, but it sounded so hateful that she didn't ask any questions.
At some point, Karen had been told that Dottye was supposed to have an abortion. She was on her way to do so when another gal died. They used to call these abortions "back ally" because they were illegal and often not done by doctors who had the skills or medical equipment needed. When they heard that the gal had died, they canceled the abortion. This, was her first born. We are not sure where she stayed to have the baby, my mind allows me to think of the horror. She was 15 years old.
We had to piece things together but could not find a lot of people whom we currently knew who would speak about anything that had to do with Dottye.
Classmates.com. I decided to join the group and post what we believed to be Dottye's high school years. I would send out my 20 emails a day to others who went to the same school around the same time period as Dottye.
We knew Dottye's parents were strict. Karen remembered there being bars on the windows of the house. She had been told by Ruby that Dottye was always sneaking out and getting into trouble. Of coarse as Ruby tells it,Dottye always remained the one who was treated well and Ruby was not. I've always had my doubts about that, and as people from classmates.com my gut couldn't help but to twist.
Of the 200 emails that I sent out I had found 4 people who knew her. I also had a lot of replies offering encouragement in my search. I did not start out by telling these people that I was adopted. I simply told them that Dottye had died when my sister and I were very young, that we knew she had a troubled past and were looking for anything that anyone might remember. I made one dear friend during all of this and I call him my online dad. He sends out emails to myself as well as a group of his friends that are stories based on his own life. I can only imagine that if my mom had the chance to know him, now or even back then, she would have enjoyed being his friend. Someday I hope to meet him in person.
I would share the emails with my sister and we would pick away at them and then some of them might jog a memory in her mind. We knew that the first born was a female.
A reply from "B"
I think it was in 1963 that I knew Dot. This is so funny but to this day any time I see anyone eating a chicken salad sandwich on white bread I think of Dot! She had one every day for lunch at school. She also liked Mexican food and at the time we listened to Three Dog Night.
I remember eating dinner at your grandma's and they put gravy on white bread and no potatoes! Is Ruby still alive? She might know Daphne's last name. I don't think I ever knew it. I think Daphne lived by your mom. Daphne and your mom were childhood friends. Are your grandparents still alive? They would know Daphne's last name too. If anything comes to mind I will let you know.
"B"
Daphne. I needed to find Daphne. I looked through the names on classmates and found her, sent her an email and hoped. It took her some time but she did finally reply.
Wendy,
I knew your mom in grade school and our freshman year.We were close, as close as any young girls could be. She and I would go to the movies when we were in the 7th grade.My mom would take us.This has been a very long time so bear with me. My mom had given me permission to go to her house for lunch and we would make bologna sandwiches. When we finally got to be freshman, we would go to football games and went to a couple of dances. If my mind serves me right, her parents were quiet and more strict then mine.They did give her a party when we were in high school, I remember the boy I had invited did not have a ride, so her dad picked him up. Which I thought was really nice. When we were freshman we got into some trouble.We ditched school and went to South Phoenix on a city bus and met some boys. Well, somehow my folks found out and when I got home I got my butt beat and grounded. I was not allowed to see Dottye again. I can't remember if Dottye was taken out of classes so we couldn't see each other or if my schedule was changed. A couple of months after all of this I got real sick.So sick I was home bound. I never saw Dottye again. How did she die? Where? Are her parents and Ruby still alive? I hope I helped a little, it's been such a long time. I do know she was my best friend. Sorry, I don't have any photos.
She also gave me her direct email address. I replied to her, telling her how Dottye died as well as answering the rest of her questions, and never heard from her again.
And finally an email from "L"
in part: I started working at the bakery near the school and your Mama worked at the dry cleaners across the street. One day she came into the bakery and I was so shocked to see her. I had heard that she had moved away. She mentioned that she had had a baby and we talked briefly. I saw her a couple of more times and then never again. I had heard that she had passed away in the late 60's obviously that was wrong.
There we had it. I also had one person who said they recalled Dottye being with Joey Schermetzler who went to high school at the same school. He was later known as Joe Shermie, bass player for Three Dog Night. It would seem he was rather popular while in school, being in a band I'm sure made him beyond cool with my mom!
My next step? I had to email fan clubs. Yup, I went for it. I emailed several fan clubs of Three Dog Night and women from two of the fan clubs were as helpful as they could be. One of them sent me the mailing address to Floyd Sneed, once the drummer for TDN. He called as soon as he got the letter and he was pretty amazing to speak to. He didn't remember Dottye but told me that if I found this half sister of mine, he'd be happy to talk to her and tell her all he could remember about Joe. He was super kind and added fuel to my search tank.
I then decided to go to findme.org. This is a very simple search site. I looked up births of females in Arizona and then narrowed it down to the summer of 1963, based on what the few classmates had told me. I sent in an inquiry and several days later I got a letter from "L" who was "M"'s husband. He emailed me photos of "M" as well as their daughters. If you put her photo next to Joe's, it's almost a mirror image. And their daughters look so much like Karen's daughters. It was pretty amazing. He shared with me her personality traits, and I knew we might have trouble. There seems to be this anger trait that we all carry. I'm not sure how much of that anger has to do with environment or how much of it was passed on by Dottye. My gut says that the anger or glass half empty comes from her.
Then he laid it on the line. He was getting a divorce from her after over 20 years of being married. Not only that, but he was the one to post her search, not her. She had no desire according to him to find birth family, it was he who wanted to know about her blood lines. Crap! There was really no way that tis could go well. I sent an email to him, and addressed it to her. Her response to him was "You posted the information, not me. Enjoy!"
I then sent a land letter in hopes that she would get it. Her oldest daughter signed for it but "L" later told me that it was then found unopened on his desk.
Case closed. She has no adoption records though her adopted siblings do. I'm not sure if Dottye had her at home, if it was a friend of the family or what. But it was not an adoption done through the courts which is why "R" didn't have any mention of her in his file. There is not an ounce of doubt to "L", myself, Karen or anyone who see s the photos that we found our half sister.
I did try to email her some time later. I simply asked if it was her, as I had some important medical information to send her. She simply replied "Stop." and so I did.
I had set out to do what I wanted. It didn't turn out the way I had hoped, but there was a part of me who sensed that it might not. I met my goal which was to find our siblings and share with them what I knew. I couldn't force them to be in contact, or to read what I sent them.
I still hoped to find more people who knew Dottye. How as it that in her entire life we could only find a few people who knew her, and when we did find them they would only speak once or twice about her and then that was it?
What was it about Dottye that made her so intriguing to us and yet so forgetful to others?
Doesn't she deserve to be remembered?
She gave four people life, didn't that count for anything?
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