Armed with only a first name, an occupation and a connection to Calgary, a 45-year-old woman from California is attempting to meet her father.
Bonnie Eklund, a nurse practitioner, has never met the man who has no idea of her existence but she hopes an online ad will allow her the opportunity.
“You want to know what somebody looks like, you want to know if you have other siblings, you want to see somebody from that side of the family to see if there's some familiarity,” said Eklund.
In the summer of 1969, Eklund’s mother had a love affair in Regina, Saskatchewan with a travelling pharmaceutical representative named Gary from Calgary.
“She was about 21 years old, very pretty, blonde, green eyes, about 5’8”,” said Toni Rempel, Bonnie’s half-sister who lives in Kelowna. “Her name was Vernette Eklund and she went to the Westward Inn Regina which at the time was the disco dancing joint."
“They had a love affair that lasted through the summer and then ended.”
Vernette became pregnant and Bonnie was born in April of 1970 in Tisdale, Saskatchewan.
Eklund spent decades wondering about her father and his life. Rempel placed an online ad in the Calgary Sun on January 3 of this year in the hope of uniting her half-sister with her father.
“We know his name is Gary, his last name ends with something ‘-ski’,” explains Rempel. “He may be of Polish or Ukrainian descent. He was Caucasian, blond, slender, and in his twenties.”
To date, the classified ad has yielded no leads.
Should Gary’s identity surface, Eklund says she would love to meet him but she has no expectations and is not looking for a father figure.
“Unless you've walked in the shoes, it's hard for people to know,” explains Eklund. “It’s not a matter of not feeling complete, it's just that curiosity.”
Anyone with information about the identity of Bonnie Eklund’s father is asked to contact Toni Rempel at t.rempel@yahoo.ca
With files from CTV's Shaun Frenette
