Just a few days before John and Nancy Codner arrived in Athens, Greece, Nancy had been able to get the name of the village where her grandfather, Antonios Giannousopoulos, was born and the names of his parents.

She had sought this information for many years without success. Without it, their trip to Greece would have been futile.

Now, one problem remained: neither John nor Nancy could speak Greek nor knew their way around. It was at this time an LDS missionary couple introduced them to my husband, John, and me. What a coincidence: we had the same first names!

We went to Nancy's grandfather's home village and started looking at one of the record books. The town hall secretary claimed to only have recent records and was impatient, not wanting them to look for very long. She said the previous secretary had burned the old records and that the town had taken him to court but nothing had happened to him, and that she did not know his name.

Nancy privately went down the road to pray for help. After her prayer she decided to take a few pictures of this little ancestral village. It was then she saw an old truck coming down the road pulling a wagon of hay bales piled high. She took a picture. The driver stopped the truck, upset his picture was taken without permission.

My husband was hailed to translate. He explained who Nancy was and that the village was the birthplace of her grandfather. It turned out she and the truck driver were distant cousins. He said the previous secretary was a good man and that the story about the burning of the records was untrue. He gave them the name of the secretary and suggested they go and see him.

Such a kind and humble man he was, filled with the spirit of Elijah. Painstakingly copying the town records, he had made a genealogy of the entire village. After being told there was a place in the United States that could preserve all his hard work and make it available to anyone who wanted to see it, he allowed the Codners to photocopy every page to take to the Church Family History Library in Salt Lake City. He wanted nothing in return, and was even reluctant to accept a thank you note from Nancy Codner.