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Photo by Sam Yu
This leatherbound Catholic prayer book was lost by someone at the Starbucks on West Seventh Street in Frederick. It was found by Leslie Williamson, who is trying to reunite the book with its owner.
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Leslie Williamson needs help reuniting a 50-year-old-plus Catholic prayer book with its owner. The fifth-grade math teacher found the Sunday missal, written in Latin and English, near Starbucks in the College Park shopping center on Seventh Street about 10 days ago. She hasn't had any luck returning the hand-sized, black leather-bound volume. "I've called every Catholic church around and have not been able to locate the owner," Williamson said. "I know this may sound weird, but the prayer book is very old and in very, very good condition. It is in a leather case and someone has to be missing this heirloom. I really want to get it to the proper place." The 352-page missal has a chalice, a rising sun, and the letters IHS (an ancient monogram for Jesus Christ), embossed on its leather case and in red on the book's cover. Its formal title is "My Sunday Missal," and it bears a 1938 copyright date. It is described on the inside jacket as using a new translation of the New Testament, written by the Rt. Rev. Msgr. Joseph F. Steadman, Confraternity of the Precious Blood, of Brooklyn, New York. "It's in immaculate condition, not a single torn page, and it has several prayer cards inside," Williamson said. A name, Helen Mitchell, is written in pencil inside the book, which also contains a signed colored prayer card for an elderly man, Charles Merrin. Williamson believes, from her Internet research, that Merrin recently died. In the book is another prayer card for a young, deceased Polish priest as well. "What's really amazing, is the day I found it, it was sunny and all the snow was melting in the parking lot outside of Starbucks," Williamson said. "The prayer book was sitting in the only dry spot remaining in the entire area." Williamson, who is Jewish and a Hebrew school instructor, happened to be on her way to teach an afterschool class at nearby Beth Sholom when she found the book. "I thought that was interesting coincidence," she said. "Then, I had to call my Catholic friends to find out what it was." Williamson said the owner of the missal can reach her by e-mail at mrswilliamson@aol.com.
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