Connections

Is there a difference between father-son connections and daddy-daughter ties?

Can you guess the gender of the child who duplicated a dad's grand feat to the day? Whether it was a boy or girl who went into the restaurant business with a culinary naif pop? If lymphoma cared which kid it first manifested itself in before being discovered in the dad? Or, if it was a boy or girl who gave dad the financial leads that led them both to be arraigned on charges of insider trading?

At the back of the book of connections you'll find the answers.

It was Huffines (Texas) Middle School's Cameron Champagne who hit his first home run twenty years to the day that his father Stephen hit his first four-bagger over the outfield wall in a baseball game.

Gina Dandrea, 18, and father Pat, 50, are teaming the daughter's restaurant experience and father's construction capabilities (he demolishes and then rebuilds restaurants) to open up Cafe Amenity in Rochester, N.Y.

The malady first infected Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester and now threatens his father, Pierce County (Wash.) Sheriff's Deputy Pat, who credits his son's ability to battle with inspiring him. "Having lived it with him and going through the whole thing, he knew that I knew what he had gone through," said Jon. "There was kind of that understanding between the two of us."

And it was Donna Murdoch, an investment consultant, in Oaks, Pa., who was the dutiful child and shared some inside takeover info from a friend of hers. Although perhaps here's where she really went wrong: dad made less than one-sixth in illegal profits than she did.

So, how are your gender identification skills?

** Father and child isn't just biology. **