The mystery began last Friday when an advertisement in the Otago Daily Times said a woman called Johanna Van Duyn, who died in Bundaberg, Australia, in 2011, had left half her estate to the ''Intellectually Handicapped Children'' in Dunedin.
The Public Trustee of Queensland, administering Mrs Van Duyn's will, was looking for a successor organisation which could apply for part of her estate.
No-one from IHC Dunedin recognised her name, but ODT readers came forward yesterday and revealed her connection to Dunedin and reasons for her bequest.
Mrs Van Duyn and her husband, Diederik (Dick) Adrianus Van Duyn, left Dunedin in the late 1970s on the steel yacht Johanna, which Mr Van Duyn built and named after his wife.
The Netherlands-born couple made friends in the city, including Selwyn Chalmers and his wife, Pam.
Mrs Chalmers worked as a dental assistant with Mrs Van Duyn, whom they knew as Anne, at the University of Otago's dental school.
Mrs Van Duyn, who had no children of her own, worked with a dentist called Harvey McClymont and treated intellectually handicapped children.
''My wife thinks she can vaguely recall Anne coming back after lunch one day saying she had left her money to IHC, because she had no family of course.''
They had fond memories of the couple, with whom they became quite close.
The Van Duyns left them some of their belongings, including a projector, when they sailed away.
''We never heard from them again.
''I just hope that it [the money] does come back here, because she really enjoyed working with those kids,'' Mr Chalmers said.
Other readers, including Colin Withnall QC, said the pair were members of the Otago Yacht Club and friends with fellow member Martin Van Der Wende, who had a daughter with Down syndrome.
This was another reason why, in a will dated March 15, 1971, she chose to leave half her estate to helping Dunedin's intellectually handicapped children.
Ruth Watson, who yesterday researched the pair's history, said they married in New Zealand in 1952 after arriving from the Netherlands on the SS Sibajak.
They were both born in The Hague in 1931.
In 1975 they were both naturalised.
The first electoral roll they appeared on was in 1978, when their address was listed as 150 London St, Dunedin.
In 1978, Diederik was listed as a carpenter and Johanna a dental assistant.
A death notice published in the ODT said Mr Van Duyn died suddenly while on their yacht, Johanna, in 2006.
Another advertisement by the Public Trustee of Queensland published in 2014 said Mrs Van Duyn was living in a rest-home when she died.
The Trustee has not revealed the size of the estate.
A person who knew Mrs Van Duyn through the Otago Yacht Club said she was suffering from Alzheimer's in the years before she died and Mr Van Duyn had died of a heart
attack.
