Little Mister Victory; A daughter’s search for the woman who abandoned her father on VJ Day

This coming spring, under its America Through Time imprint, Sutton Books will publish Little Mister Victory, the story of co-author Tina Drzal's decades-long search for the woman who abandoned her father on VJ Day. Using cutting-edge DNA analysis and good-old-fashioned burrowing into newspaper archives, ecclesiastic and government documents, she was found, along with a surprise. Abandoning her newborn baby was not the most shocking act of her life. (This photo, taken the evening of August 15, 1945, shows Boston City Hospital nurse Eileen Resmini holding Tina's dad.) 

Sixteen year-old newsboy Charles Spataro was watching the celebration, waiting to begin his shift at the nearby Park Street subway station when a woman - a stranger to him - asked if he would watch her baby while she performed an errand. She pressed two dollars into his hand and she promised to return shortly.

She never did.

During a week in which the most deadly and costly war in American history had finally ended, the story of the abandoned baby would make the front pages of Boston newspapers. The timing of the his abandonment was not lost on war-weary Americans, and several papers took to calling the boy “Little Mr. Victory,” a nickname which endeared him to the hearts of Bostonians.  

Neither the mother or father ever came forward. After two weeks the baby was placed in foster care, and was later adopted. When he grew up and learned of his troubled start in life, he began a search for his biological parents. After he passed in 1987. his daughter Tina picked up the search. By chance, she found David's 2005 Boston Globe article about the abandonment. A collaboration began and together, with the help of a genealogist, they cracked the case and found the mother. That was when they discovered a surprising coda to the story. 

Abandoning Tina’s father was not the most shocking act of her life.

After his abandonment the baby was given the name Robert Harrington and placed into foster care. Five years later, he was adopted by John and Dorothy Garvey of Allston, Massachusetts. His first day with the Garvey's would be a memorable one, as you will read in the sample chapter below... 

Her beloved father Robert - the former Little Mister Victory - had passed fourteen years earlier on the September 11, so the date already had deep meaning for Tina. In 2001, the day America was attacked, she was working for United Airlines. The weeks and months which followed presented challenges both as an employee, and as a wife and mother. As with many Americans, it also cause her to re-evaluate her purpose in life. Her decision would lead to the solving the mystery of her father's life, and to her book with David. Her 9/11 story is posted below...