A gnarled and twisted family tree

YAKIMA, Wash. — As a child, Sharon Estrada never questioned her mother. But as an adult she's spent a lifetime unraveling her late mother's dark mysteries.

For 40 years, Estrada has been tracking down brothers and sisters, many that her mother denied ever existed.

"When you know you have a sibling out there ... You just have this black hole," said the Moxee retiree.

So far, she knows her mother had 15 children. But she suspects there may be as many as six more. She wants, desperately wants, the world to be on the lookout for clues and leads.

Estrada yearns to fill in all the blanks before she dies, to make some sense of her mother's convoluted tale that made so little sense growing up.

"That's my life goal, is to bring all my siblings together," she said.

Stories are hard to believe

The search, however, involves sorting out the life of her mother, a woman she calls a sociopath who lied her way through marriages, pregnancies and life.

"She'd come home and say, 'The baby died,'" Estrada said. "I didn't question that."

Her version of events is echoed by her siblings. While she's taken the lead in the search, three other sisters who recently gathered to talk about the case nodded in agreement to all of Estrada's claims. They're the first to admit the stories are hard to believe.

"It seems bizarre to us," said sister Myrna Taylor, 51, of Yakima.

Neatly stacked in a cupboard at Estrada's home are black binders containing copies of marriage records, birth certificates, DNA results, wills and other documents she's collected over a lifetime.

The information has been useful in convincing newly contacted -- but understandably skeptical -- siblings about their real family.

This much her family knows:

Her mother was born Dimple Caroline Belcher in Rosebud, Ill. She married at least seven different men, always taking their last names. She lived in at least five different states. Some marriages overlapped.

She often refers to her mother simply as "Dimple," a proposed title for her book, for which she is seeking a publisher.

Estrada remembers Dimple as beautiful, charming and graceful. She never swore, smoked or drank alcohol. She worked as a waitress, often up until the day before her delivery.

Estrada was Dimple's first child, at least that the siblings know about. Actually, she was a twin, but Estrada's sister was adopted out.

Growing up, Estrada never went to school. Instead, her stepfather, the late Esquiel Estrada, whom Dimple married twice, taught her to read using dictionaries, encyclopedias and other books around the house.

Dimple had a baby or babies almost every year. Some Dimple adopted out from the hospital, some she sent away with their biological fathers, some she insisted were stillborn, Estrada said.

And some, Estrada said, were flat-out sold.

Estrada grew up with three siblings. She raised them because they were much younger.

Four other children also lived with Estrada and Dimple for about six years, first in Seattle, later in San Diego.

But one day, when Estrada was 9, Dimple loaded the four in the car and took them -- ages 2 to 5 -- to their biological father's house. The man gave Dimple $50 for each. Estrada says she remembers seeing the check.

Estrada never heard from them until she began her research as an adult.

In 1955, Dimple went to the hospital to give birth. But when she came home, she told Estrada that the boy died in delivery. His name is Jeff Cook and he now lives in Sedona, Ariz. Estrada found him in 1996.

Found her siblings after mom died

Weary of the deceit, Estrada began moving away from her mother about age 19. However, the two always seemed to reunite, Estrada recalls. In 1979, her mother, stricken with cervical cancer, reached out to Estrada, who lived in Montana at the time.

Dimple died on Dec. 9 that year, telling Estrada she was always jealous of her.

Estrada has been married four times and had two sons. One died at birth in Montana, the other at the age of 43 from a blood clot.

Estrada spent the 1990s being active in Montana state politics. She served one term in the state senate from 1994 to 1998. In 2000, she co-chaired the Yellowstone County Republican Central Committee, according to the Billings Gazette.

Now retired, Estrada moved to Yakima in 2007 to be close to her sisters Sandy Beckmann and Taylor, who she found in 1996 and 1997. She lives in Moxee off Social Security and a widow's benefit.

Bitterness over history of secrets

Estrada admits she is bitter toward her mother.

"My life didn't start until the day she died," Estrada said.

Veronica Hart, her twin, has many of the same feelings. She was adopted as a baby, but her adopted mother died when she was 2. She went to live with her adoptive grandparents in Seattle, believing they were her biological parents. Her grandmother died when she was 9.

At age 13, her grandfather told her the truth. She ran away and grew up in a group home.

Estrada first contacted Hart about 21/2 years ago. For a while, Hart refused to believe any stories about her biological family, but DNA confirmed the relationship in March last year.

"My whole history is nothing but secrets and cover up," says Hart, who lives in Ellensburg.

Some of the siblings, Estrada learned, had died before she contacted them.

Keeping in touch

But the story has happy endings, too.

She regularly visits her sisters Taylor and Beckmann in Yakima. They were adopted by other families as babies and lived what Beckmann calls a "normal childhood" full of Girl Scout meetings and church activities.

"The adopted ones, we felt like we were the lucky ones," says Beckmann, 64.

The siblings, now scattered through at least seven states, have attended reunions and visit on holidays. Some traveled to Montana to help one of Estrada's senate campaigns.

On Jan. 18 this year, the twins celebrated their 65th birthday with a dinner at the Hilton Garden Inn in Yakima. It was their first birthday together.

Taylor and Beckmann sat with them. All four sisters gave each other gold bracelets.

"They're matching bracelets you put on and never take off," Estrada says.

* Ross Courtney can be reached at 930-8798 or rcourtney@yakimaherald.com.

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