'Christmas Miracle' Unites Long-Lost Siblings
DETROIT (WWJ) A Detroit woman and her 81-year-old brother are spending their first holiday season together after a decades-long lie unraveled thanks to social media.
It's a Christmas miracle, and Randye Bullock, 65, believes in miracles.
She told WWJ's Vickie Thomas she had never met her brother; in fact, her family was told he died when he was 9 years old.
In reality, he had been adopted as a baby. He and Bullock share a father, Paul Smith. When she finally tracked her brother down, thanks to a Facebook lead, she knew immediately who he was.
"No DNA needed, he looks like my daddy incarnated," Bullock said.
Born at Providence Hospital in 1933, her brother Charles Fiedler was put up for adoption for reasons that were, at the time, scandalous.
It was all about race and religion, he told Thomas.
"I was 12 years old and people started calling me a mulatto, I had no idea what a mulatto was," he said. "I asked my adopted parents what that was and they told me I was adopted."
He added he was also told his mother was a prostitute, and he "just threw the idea out from trying to find my parents, my real parents."
Fiedler's daughter, Gabrielle, tracked down Bullock through social media after getting a lead from her cousin.
They met for the first time before Christmas.
"When I met Randye, all I could say was 'wow,'" he said. "She was so beautiful to me."