It Was A Simple Movie Night For Her Until She Found Mother's Wallet Lost 65 Years Ago

The Plaza Theatre in Atlanta, USA, is not only the oldest cinema hall in the city but also a cultural landmark. Over the years, since its opening in 1939, it has undergone multiple renovations. Recently, the theatre’s owner Chris Escobar was overseeing renovations at a bathroom stall when the contractors found a hidden space behind a crumbled wall. This hidden space was once a bathroom closet before it was covered. Inside this closet was an old burgundy-coloured wallet. A look at the things inside the wallet revealed that it must have been lost over 60 years ago in the 1950s.

It contained several things such as a lucky-draw ticket to win a 1959 Chevrolet car, credit cards with no magnetic strips, black and white family photos, insurance cards, a license, and even a doctor’s note.

Chris Escobar was determined to track the owner of the wallet or at least their family and return it to them. While speaking to CNN, Escobar said, “It was a portal back in time, and then realizing that this has been missing from this family of real people who lived in this neighborhood for 65 years, imagine if we could find them.”

The owner’s name on the license read ‘Floy Culbreth’. However, in the 1950s, women in the USA were often referred to by their husbands’ first names.

Fortunately, Escobar’s wife Nicole, whom he calls an “internet sleuth”, was able to track down the wallet’s owner by going through multiple rabbit holes, until she found a website for the Culbreth Cup. This charity golf tournament raises funds for a cerebral palsy nonprofit held by the Culbreth family. She then found that the wallet belonged to a woman called Roy Culbreth, who actively worked for the cause of cerebral palsy awareness and treatment before she died.

Nicole and Escobar managed to get in touch with Roy Culbreths’ daughter, Thea Chamberlain and gave her the mother’s lost wallet.

Chamberlain, now 71, was only 6 years old when her mom lost the wallet. Talking about the wallet’s unexpected discovery, Chamberlain said, “It was quite touching, a flood of memories came back, and it kind of brought her back again.” The Culbreths later gathered together to go over the wallet’s content and remember their late family member.