‘It can’t be, there’s no way’: Gulf War pen pals reunite unexpectedly in Las Vegas Valley

HENDERSON, Nev. (FOX5) - During the Gulf War, a serviceman in Saudi Arabia found comfort in letters written from a high schooler in Chicago.

Now, more than 30 years later, their story ties back to the Las Vegas Valley.

When you're thousands of miles away from home, a small piece of home goes a long way. For Navy Corpsman Gordon Ashlee, that came in the form of letters from 14-year-old Marcy Alfrejd.

An English assignment to write a letter to a serviceman led to years of correspondence.

"I would tell him what my assignments were, or what I was working on at school," Alfrejd says, describing what she would include in her letters.

Out of her entire English class, Alfrejd says she was the only one to get a response back.

"I grabbed one and opened it and read it from Marcy, and I was like 'oh that's really nice that they do that,' so I felt kind of like I should write back, so I did," Ashlee says.

Eventually, those responses stopped coming.

Then, 30 years later, Alfrejd is looking through a box of keepsakes at her parent's house, when she comes across the saved letters and decides to reach out to Ashlee on Facebook.

"Hi Gordon, my name is Marcy, and I'm looking for someone that I was a pen pal with in the 1990s. Did you happen to serve in the military, specifically Desert Storm?" Alfrejd says, reading the message she sent to Ashlee.

She gets a response, but it's what she learns after that begs the question: coincidence or fate?

Alfrejd and Ashlee both now live in Henderson.

"It can't be, there's no way that's the exact same person," she says, explaining her reaction to the news.

Alfrejd moved to the valley seven years ago for her business. Ashlee and his wife moved to Henderson for retirement in 2020.

After 30 years, the two former pen pals live only seven minutes apart, giving them every opportunity to catch up on decades of memories.

"To reconnect as friends now was cool for me because of our past, and just that connection we have," Ashlee says.