53-Year Search Concludes With Emotional Reunion
March 4, 2026
In 1972, an unexpected discovery was made in an Ohio shopping center parking lot. A newborn baby, left in a shopping cart, was found by two young women. Now, 53 years later, those women have been reunited with the baby they once saved, marking an emotional culmination to a story that has spanned over five decades.
Rita, Darlene and Pearl / Credit: news5cleveland.com
Pearl Marshall, adopted in Cleveland the same year she was found, lived a fulfilling life as a Girl Scout, music teacher, and later, a spouse to her husband, Jack. Yet, she longed to uncover the mysteries of her earliest days.
This quest for answers took a pivotal turn when Ohio’s adoption records were unsealed. Pearl’s request for her original birth certificate yielded a surprising “foundling report” instead.
“It was a foundling report,” she said. “A Jane Doe certificate. It says, ‘Jeanne Westgate.’”
The birth certificate intriguingly referenced her birthplace as Westgate Shopping Center, aligning with a story Pearl’s adoptive mother had once speculated about—a newspaper piece on a baby found in a parking lot.
Determined to piece together her past, Pearl scoured online archives, discovering a brief headline: “Abandoned Baby Found at Plaza.” Her pursuit of more information led her to contact the police, and the case found its way to Chris Gerrett, a historical researcher in Fairview Park, who was intrigued by the mystery.
“I don’t golf. I don’t travel. This is what I do for fun!” Gerrett said.
While no official police documentation survived, Gerrett uncovered news articles detailing the baby’s discovery—clothed in yellow, swaddled in a blue blanket, and left on August 20, 1972.
Next, Gerrett embarked on a mission to locate the women who had found the baby. Delving into property, school, and probate records, she eventually identified a phone number linked to one of the women’s families.
“I called him… and told him I was looking for a couple women who found an abandoned baby at Westgate in the ’70s, and fingers crossed he didn’t think he was talking to some lunatic and hang up on me!” Gerrett recalled. “It was dead silent, and after a very long pause, he said, ‘My mother told me that story years ago.’”
With that, the trail led her to them.
The Night of Discovery
That fateful night in late summer 1972, friends Rita Marshall and Darlene Gilleland were leaving a movie theater at Westgate Shopping Center when a shopping cart pushed against their car caught their attention.
Inside the cart lay a rustling paper bag.
“The bag was rustling,” Gilleland remembered.
“I had to get in close because it was dark,” Marshall said. “And I saw her little face, and I said, ‘Darlene, it’s a baby, it’s a baby!’”
Hours-old, the newborn was dressed in yellow and wrapped securely in a blue blanket. Marshall and Gilleland immediately contacted the police, accompanying the baby to the hospital where she was pronounced healthy and given the name Jeanne Westgate.
Referred to child services, she was later adopted, but the memory of that night stayed with Marshall and Gilleland.
“I’ve always thought about her,” Marshall expressed. “Wondered how she was. What she was doing.”
A Long-Awaited Reunion
This past summer, thanks to Gerrett’s dedication, the women shared a long-awaited reunion.
“There were a lot of tears, a lot of talking, a lot of laughing, and a lot of hugging,” Gerrett described.
“I feel like our long-lost baby has come home,” Marshall shared with a smile.
Retracing their steps, the women revisited the shopping center. Though the movie theater no longer stands, the shopping center persists, with the exact spot now behind a Lowe’s store—a place quietly holding a remarkable past.
“We always felt like someone was watching to make sure we found you,” Marshall and Gilleland told Pearl.
For Marshall and Gilleland, the reunion marked closure.
“I won’t forget the day that we found her,” Gilleland noted. “And I won’t forget the day that we found her again!”
Today, Pearl holds the rich tapestry of her early days—a narrative woven with empathy, tenacity, and a reunion that was half a century in the making.
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