You just never know what might turn up when renovating an old building!
A building in League City, Texas now serves as the League City Community Center, but for many decades, it was the League City School. Thousands of students attended classes there over the years, and one of them lost her purse sometime in April 1959.
Sixty-two years later, contractor Armando Rodriguez was demolishing the old stage during a renovation when he discovered the battered purse buried amongst some other debris. He could tell it was old just by looking at it, so he didn’t open it and turned it right in to authorities at the Clear Creek Independent School District.
The school district was captivated by the discovery, which provided a unique glimpse into what life was like for a 14 or 15-year-old student in the 1950s. The purse contained a wallet, a diary, calendars, photographs, and other trinkets.
League City Historical Society Vice President Richard Lewis said the purse was like “today’s Facebook.”
“You’re putting everything down,” he said in a video. “She wrote about her love life, who she broke up with.”
Officials got to work tracking down the purse’s rightful owner. They found a name inside the purse, Beverly Williams, and a note from her mother. They managed to find Andrea Beverly Williams, who was born in 1945 and was a junior at the school in 1959. Unfortunately, when they tracked down her heirs, they learned that Beverly passed away in 2016.
Authorities were able to speak with Beverly’s daughter, who couldn’t believe her mother’s belongings had been hidden for all these years.
The purse will now be returned to Beverly’s family. They must be so grateful for this unexpected time capsule from her life all those years ago!
Beverly likely never expected to leave behind a snapshot of her life as a teenager. In fact, she was probably very upset to misplace her purse! Now that she’s no longer with us, this seems like a lovely gift to leave her family.
Don’t forget to share this story that gives us some insight from the past.
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