119-Year-Old Diploma Reunited With Man's Roseville Granddaughter
ROSEVILLE (CBS13) — A 119-year-old diploma found in a basement now belongs to the Roseville granddaughter of the man who earned it.
It all started with a basement cleanup in Southern California. Thanks to a determined homeowner and a genealogist who learned about the story, a family connection dating back to 1896 was made.
Sally Traywick still can't get over a phone call she received last week connecting her with a man seen in a Great Depression-era photograph.
"I got a call from my niece and she said someone is looking for Clarence McDonald Stevenson, do you know him? And I said, 'That's my grandfather!"'
The phone call came after a Southern California woman named Julia Brown contacted her niece. Brown was recently cleaning the basement of her Los Angeles are home when she came across the diploma.
"Somebody held this thing in their hands after a lot of hard work getting a doctorate degree over 100 years ago and it's still here," she said.
The diploma showed Stevenson received a doctorate of optics degree from the Northern Illinois College of Ophthalmology and Otology.
"I was just stunned when I really looked at it closely and looked at the year I was like no I'm reading this incorrectly," Brown said.
Brown had no idea who Stevenson was or how his diploma ended up in her basement. But she was determined to track down a relative.
"It deserves to be somewhere other than our basement for sure," she said.
After CBS in Los Angeles showed her story and plea for help, a genealogist saw it, did some research and contacted Brown's niece.
Traywick had some photos of her grandfather, but never knew much about him. She's grateful Brown was determined to put Clarence's diploma in the right hands. And now, she's determiend to uncover more of this mystery.
"My grandfather passed away in 1943 and the house that it was found in wasn't built until 1947 so we don't know the connection," she said.
Traywick says the diploma is too delicate to be mailed, so she will pick it up in the next couple of weeks in person. She says she can't wait to see it and thanked Brown for bringing back Stevenson's diploma to the family.
