A Trans-Pacific Reunion
After decades apart, a father and daughter separated by the globe reconnect on a Seattle street.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
By a strange current of events, Mrs. Evan Johns, who had parted from her father in Wales in her babyhood, met him again in this city last Thursday after each had come halfway around the globe. Eighteen or twenty years ago, David Davies, a practical miner, left his family in Newbridge, Wales, to seek a fortune in Japan. When he bade goodbye to his family, his youngest child, a little girl, was a baby. Davies drifted from one part of Japan to another, then cast his lot in Washington. Meanwhile, his daughter married and moved with her family to Butte, Montana. A short time ago, the family decided to move to Black Diamond, and while making arrangements, they stopped in Seattle. Through a chance encounter at the Phoenix hotel on Washington street, they learned that David Davies came to Seattle frequently. Last Wednesday night, Mrs. Johns arrived in Seattle. The next morning, she was told to look for a man who wore his hat over one eye. Not half a block from South Third, she met a man she thought to be her father. Without hesitation, she called his name. They stood looking at one another, then, as the truth dawned, kissed, embraced, and began to cry. The father and daughter returned to the Phoenix hotel to share their story before she boarded the train for Black Diamond.
“They stood for a moment looking at one another, then as if the truth dawned on both, kissed, embraced and began to cry.”
This story highlights the transience and displacement inherent in the 1890s Pacific Northwest, where families were often fragmented by the global pursuit of mining and industrial work. Today, while travel is instantaneous, the region remains a crossroads for displaced families seeking stability, echoing the same human desire for connection in a shifting landscape.
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