Facebook Page Serves as a Lost and Found for Tornado Victims

Memories Lost to a Whirlwind Alight on Facebook to Be Claimed. (The New York Times, 4/29/2011)

Excerpt:   The tornado that killed Emily Washburn’s grandfather this week also destroyed his Mississippi home, leaving his family with nothing to remember him by — until a picture of him holding the dog he loved surfaced on Facebook, posted by a woman who found it in her office parking lot, 175 miles away in Tennessee.

An image that Patty Bullion, of Lester, Ala., found and posted on a Facebook page she created that serves as a lost and found.

Patty Bullion, whose page has so far reunited dozens of storm survivors with their possessions.

Like hundreds of others finding keepsakes that fell from the sky and posting photographs of them on a Facebook lost and found, the woman included her e-mail address, and Ms. Washburn wrote immediately: “That man is my granddaddy. It would mean a lot to me to have that picture.”

Created by Patty Bullion, 37, of Lester, Ala., a page on the social networking site has so far reunited dozens of storm survivors with their prized — and in some cases, only — possessions: a high school diploma that landed in a Lester front yard was traced to its owner in Tupelo, Miss., for example.