Forty and Found a Huge Surprise.......

This today is going out to all my friends that I have relocated through FaceBook...
To Pam, Denise, Pat, David, and Tim you will learn some things about me that reflect ho I truly feel....
December 28th, 1959 I was born at the Texas Osteopath Hospital in Fort Worth, Texas...This is where the journey that would become my life started its humble beginning...
Moving forward now to December 1982...On the 3rd of this month my father; World Champion cutting horse trainer Hoot Walker passed away, it was 25 days from my 23rd birthday..My mom and I traveled out of town on the weekend of the 11th to visit with relatives...During this trip my mom informed me that I had been adopted the day after I was born...This revelation totally stunned me and I questioned why I had not been told sooner...My mom and her relatives in Weatherford, Texas that we were visiting told me that I had known I was adopted since I was six years old. My mom told me that I went to court to get my birth certificate and when the judge asked me if I was happy with my parents: I told him that I was, and that I didn't want to talk about that anymore...I believe that I at that moment suppressed that memory and filed it in the recycle bin....
The information my mom gave me was simply this...If I wished to know anything about my adoption and the family that gave me up for adoption I would have to travel to Fort Worth and see Retired FederaL Judge Byron Matthews....He was a very good man that had been the D.A. in Tarrant County, and at this time in 1982 he was a successful defense attorney with offices in Tandy Towers...He would go on to the seat of federal judge before his career was finished....Judge Matthews was very nice to me when I went to see him...He answered my questions with five statements about my real mother...Her name was Marguerith Johnke, she was Czechoslovakian, lived in St. Paul, Minnesota, had 2 other children a brother a year younger, also a sister a year older, and had been having an affair with a married man(hence where I entered the picture)....Of these five statements only two of them were the truth; her name was Margreth Johnke and she was from St. Paul, Minnesota...The ones that were false: she was actually Swiss/Irish and who my father actually was will remain a mystery that not finding out does not hurt my feelings any....He also told me that he could give me more information if the law offices hadn't had a fire and those files were destroyed....Knowing now what I didn't know then the fire they had was most likely in the parking lot where they poured gasoline on those records and set them ablaze(those records would have been able to connect them to the gray market of the late 50's, early 60's...private attorney adoptions).....I sent letters to the St. Paul newspaper trying to find out more information about my real mother, but after receiving no responses I filed that memory away, often wishing would I ever know my real family.....
Now we can fast forward one last time to March 2000...
My 2nd wife and I had been visiting my mom in Wichita Falls and had rummaged around for paperwork that might be able to identify me..We had found a receipt from the hospital for a minor surgery after I was born....It listed my mother's real name, her address at the time I was born, her best friend's name in Minnesota, and the total amount it cost for my parents to take me home---$254.00.....That same visit my mom purchased a new home computer for us...When we got back to Fort Worth, got it connected to the internet, I decided to search adoption websites in search of my real mother's name.....That search on Google yielded 2 websites with a match to that name.....The first I looked at said the people looking were looking for a baby girl Johnke born in December, 1959 in Fort Worth, Texas...At this time I figured it was someone else, so I didn't bother to look at the other website...Just like the sterotypical cat curiosity got the best of me and at 2:30 am. I went back to look at the 2nd website; and here is where that huge surprise hit me in the face....It said this: Looking for babygirl Johnke, born December 28th, 1959 at the Texas Osteopathic Hospital in Fort Worth, Texas...As I continued to read to the right I was shocked at what I read, you have 8 brothers and sisters looking for you...It stated they had my birth file number if I wanted to send a copy of my birth certificate....I looked at my birth certificate, copied the file number, and sent it to the email address that was listed there....The next morning at 5:30 am after 3 hours sleep I was getting ready for work when the phone rang..My wife gave it to me and told me there was a woman that wanted to talk to me; My first words to her were Am I the brother you are looking for---YES was her answer...Wow at that very moment my life changed forever; I now had 3 brothers in Minnesota, 2 sisters in Minnesota, 2 sisters in Texas, and 1 brother in Texas..I also had nieces and nephews that I did not believe would ever happen....I have oldest brother Rick in Minnesota, oldest sister Denise in Minnesota & Florida, next oldest sister Pam in Caldwell, Texas, older brother David in Bluffdale, Texas, older sister Jana(who does not have a birth certificate at all) in Lingleville, Texas, younger sister Pat in Minnesota, and younger brothers Tim and Tom in Minnesota....By the end of that day I had talked to all of my brothers and sisters..I have now met all of them here and there except my oldest brother Rick....That was on a Wednesday, Thursday my sister Jana came to visit me in Fort Worth with pictures that she had picked up when she was in Minnesota earlier....The next weekend my brother Tom flew to DFW to meet me and then meet me at my sister Pam's so I could meet the rest of the Texas bunch....The first thing Tom asked of me was for me to remove my glasses so he could see my eyes(crystal blue), at which he said that I had Grandma Lucy's eyes...Her maiden name was Flogerzi and she had married an Irish man named Lucy.....That weekend my wife and I traveled to Caldwell where I met my sister Pam, husband Danny, and 2 of her 3 children...Not long after I arrived, my brothers Tom & David arrived....It was very uncanny to me to be with 5 of my siblings and see that we all looked like each other in the face.....While in Caldwell; Pam showed me a 6 inch stack of green and white copy paper that she said was all the Darrell Walkers' in Texas...They told me that they had all gotten together in San Antonio April 26th, 1999 and began looking for me, this became just one coincidence that would be like many others...My 2nd wife Lisa and I had gotten together on the very same day....
Now we move into the present: I still haven't gotten to Minnesota although I would like to go in the early fall of this year 2010....I still haven't met my brother Rick...I have love for each and every one of these people that have entered my life...All my life I wanted to find out if I was an only child or had a family..It was very overwhelming that family I found so quickly that fateful March day.....I don't get to visit them near as much as I wish I could, but the economics haven't let me get out of Texas to head up north....


Rick in Minnesota, haven't met yet...
Denise, Minnesota & Florida, retired as a Chief Master Sergeant Air Force after 25 1/2 years, her graduation was where their search for me began....
Tom, union trim carpenter from St. Paul....
Tim, supervisor in the streets dept in St. Paul......
Pat, worked for a neighboring county in Minnesota....

Pam, christian school teacher, Caldwell.....
David, house builder, Bluffdale...
Jana, bookekeeper, Lingleville....
Darrell, ssa disability, Wichita Falls.....


Mysterious Coincidence's(I know after all these came about that it was inevitable that I found my family)
I was employed as a hot shot courier dispatcher in Arlington, Texas for 5 years...One of my best friends that worked for me was a man named John Blackwell...
My sister Jana and her husband had known John and his wife for 20 years......
My sister Pam grew up in Hamilton, Texas...My friend John asked her about someone he knew from Hamilton..Pam said that was her best friend growing up, the lady was John's first wife...
I asked John if he knew my brother David Jaquess from Bluffdale, to which he replied no...He did relate to me that when he got out of the service after the Vietnam War, he had worked at a dairy farm in Bluffdale, with a Randy Jaquess..As it turns out that was David's adopted brother....
My wife Lisa's mom lives in Crestview, Florida...Coincidentally my sister Denise had a house in Florala, Alabama...Their houses are only 30 miles apart....
These coincidences are almost as uncanny as finding my real family on the internet....
My sister Pat had an adopted sister(their mom was our mothers best friend)...Pat's sister was married to my brother Tim for 18 years......


Facts about my mother's family the Flogerzi's & the Lucy's.....
My sister Denise has visited the family chalet in Switzerland outside of Bern where the lineage was traced to the 1100's....
The Lucy's arrived in America from Ireland...I really do not know all that much about them....

I need to stay in better touch with them, but it is tough to do sometimes...I hope that they each know how much I dearly LOVE them........



Darrell J. Walker

My mother, Margeth passed away in 1988...Even though I never met her knowing the things I do, I am relieved to at least found brothers and sisters.....My mother is buried in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and I unfortunately can't even visit her grave due to my criminal record in Texas.......