A chance meeting near the BYU campus in 1972 helped reconnect a missionary with one of the families he had baptized two decades earlier. Paul S. Thompson and his wife, Marba C. Thompson, now of the Richfield (Utah) 2nd Ward, were seated in their car outside an apartment building waiting for their student-daughter to return. A small dog ran out on the sidewalk and one of the passing coeds stopped to pet the animal when Brother Thompson exclaimed to his wife:

"I know that young woman!"

He hurried from his car and asked her: "Are you a Robinson from Rochester, Minn.?"

The surprised young woman, Wendy Wiskow of St. Charles, Minn., near Rochester, said her grandmother was a Robinson from Rochester. She then learned that Brother Thompson was the missionary who had baptized her parents, Merle and Genevieve Wiskow, in 1949. Wendy, who bore an amazing resemblance to her mother, assured him that they were active in the Church and promised to tell them she had met Brother Thompson.

Twenty-one years later in 1993, Brother Thompson traveled to Rochester, Minn., and while there, he called the Wiskows. This time, the news wasn't as good. He learned that they had become less active and had never been to the temple. Sister Wiskow also had cancer, although he didn't learn about it until later.

He encouraged the Wiskows, who caught the spirit of the gospel, read the scriptures and took a temple preparation class. Unfortunately, as the temple date neared, Sister Wiskow's cancer grew worse and she was hospitalized and died before she could be sealed.

Brother Wiskow received his temple blessings in the Chicago Illinois Temple after her death. Then he and Wendy Wiskow Porter's family, which included twins Amber and Autumn who were preparing to serve missions, traveled to Salt Lake City. At the temple, they met the Thompsons, who joined them for the endowment session for the twins, and the sealing of Brother and Sister Wiskow.

"It was a great thrill," said Brother Thompson. "You almost become family, so feelings at the success of the family build up over the years."

Sister Porter commented, "I cannot express the enormous sense of love and gratitude I feel for Paul S. Thompson, who brought the gospel to my parents 50 years ago."

Illustration by John Clark.