Shock as Gil finds father’s book in charity shop 200 miles from home
A charity shop volunteer was shocked after she came across a book bearing the handwriting of her father who died 50 years ago.
Gil Oakley was tidying the bookshelves at the Hope House charity shop in Church Stretton when she stumbled across an old Stanley Gibbons stamp catalogue dated 1956.
It caught her attention as she had two similar ones at home; her father Kenneth Cleave worked for the company in London before she was born.
Curious as to what it was worth, she opened its cover and was stunned to find his distinctive handwriting neatly penned onto its opening page.
Also in the book was a sticker from Richard Roberts of Rutherfield, Sussex, where Mr Cleave went on to work when Gil was a child.
She said: “When I opened up the front cover there was my father’s writing. I recognised it straight away as my father’s writing was very tidy and he could write in very small letters.”
Not only had half a century gone by since her father passed away in 1968, but the book had followed Gil 200 miles from Kent, where she grew up, to Church Stretton.
She made the move in 1969, and said she did not think her father had ever visited Shropshire.
“It is such an amazing coincidence for it to have ended up here, in the charity shop I volunteer at,” said Gil.
“I told the girls in the shop and no one could believe it.
“It was such a coincidence that I had to purchase the catalogue.”
The book had been donated to the shop and there was no record of where it had come from.
In a bid to trace its journey over the last 50 years from her father’s hands to hers, Gil is now appealing for the person who donated it to come forward.
Anyone with information is asked to contact the shop on 01694 723742.
