Linda Lawson grew up thinking she had only a few relatives. Her grandfather's family scattered when he was 8, due to his father's death and his mother's abandonment of five of the six children. Because Lawson's grandfather rarely discussed his family, she knew little of her own heritage.

Years later, when Lawson visited a RootsWeb West Virginia Web site, she was surprised to find a message referencing the surname Hinzman — the maiden name of the woman who'd left her children so many years earlier. Although the posting was two years old, Lawson contacted the author, who e-mailed her back and in turn introduced her to many new cousins. Two cousins sent her the first photos of her great-grandmother she'd ever seen. “When I opened that e-mail,” Lawson recalls, “I sat and cried.”