CHESTERFIELD, Mo. — In this season of goodwill, a store by the same name and a memory card from a digital camera brought two St. Louis area families together.
Originally from Chesterfield, Jordyn Vermont is a senior at Mizzou studying education and is a self-proclaimed amateur photographer—and a trip to the Goodwill store in Manchester is what started it all.
Jordyn and her mom, Sharon, were shopping there during Jordyn's Thanksgiving break. She asked her mom if she could be buy a camera that was almost 20 years old from the technology section.
"When we got home, (Jordyn) said, 'Mom, there is a memory card in here.'" Sharon remembered. "I said, 'Wow, I hope the people didn't leave pictures on that. I wonder what's on that?'
"We were joking with some of the people that we had talked to, they were saying, 'Oh maybe you'll help solve a murder with these pictures.' We thought, 'I certainly hope not.'"
Instead, the memory card was full of someone's family photos from 2009. Jordyn said she wanted to send these pictures to whomever they belonged to.
So Sharon posted on Facebook to three separate pages including her own personal page asking if anyone knew the people in the photos.
"If anyone could find who they belonged to, it would be my mom because she's just really good at that type of stuff," Jordyn said.
When asked why she didn't just delete the photos, Jordyn said, "I don't know, I feel like if I had a camera out there that had my family photos out there, I would want that back."
"Especially because they were on the memory card, there is a chance that they weren't downloaded to their computer." Jordyn said. "I didn't know if some of the people in the photos weren't around anymore."
Jordyn was right.
"My dad has been gone for five years," Pat Schopp, the camera's original owner, said. "Then my aunt passed away two years ago."
Pat and her husband, Phil, bought the camera back in 2001. After cleaning out their basement in Manchester, they donated it to Goodwill in November 2023.
"I lost my mom three years ago, and I was just thinking how if someone had found pictures of her, I would be so grateful to get them," Sharon said.
As was Pat, who bumped into a friend she hadn't seen in ten years at a local craft show. Then just two days later, she got a text from Sharon that asked if the pictures on the memory card were of her family.
"I'm like, 'Oh my gosh, yes, that is my family,'" Schopp said.
"(It's) definitely magical," Schopp said. "Very exciting and just crazy. I mean it's such a small small world—it really is a small place."
Talking about the kind of young woman her daughter Jordyn has grown into, Sharon said she thinks of other people more than herself.
"(Jordyn) was the one who said we have to try to find out whose pictures they are," Sharon added. "That just showed me what a beautiful soul my daughter has."
The Vermonts and the Schopps said they're excited to stay in touch with each other now that this camera has brought them together, especially as Jordyn goes to Peru soon to study abroad and potentially pursue a master's degree in speech pathology or education.