We will resume our regular business hours of operation on Monday, July 6th, 2009.

 Our OmniTrace staff wishes you a safe and happy 4th of July!

Today we want to introduce Sheila Knies, who is a member of our Search Consultant Department.  We asked Sheila to provide a little background information about herself:

“Sheila Knies, a former Pan Am flight attendant, has a BA degree in Spanish and a Masters degree in Bicultural-Bilingual Education.  She has been married for 25 years and has two children, both in their early 20s. 

Her interest in adoption searches began when her daughter’s closest friend asked her to help locate her birth mother years ago.  She searched for six years and found out how impossible these searches were to do.  Sheila was thrilled when she found OmniTrace.  It was wonderful to discover a company whose main focus was to reunite families.  Wanting to assist in this goal, she applied for the position of Adoption Search Consultant and presently works in that position to this day.”

In future posts, we’ll introduce other members of our OmniTrace staff.  Please call or write us with any questions you may have.  Sheila and our other search consultants would love to hear from you!

Toll Free 1-888-965-6696

Email:  info@omnitrace.com

(Special thanks to Joan of nyadoptees who notified us about Colorado Open Adoption Records.)

Great news for those adopted in Colorado who are searching for their birth parents.  Persons adopted in Colorado will soon have access to their original birth records, as long as their adoption was finalized between July 1, 1951 and June 30, 1967.

OmniTrace contacted the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to confirm that Colorado open adoption records will soon be available.  They have informed us that forms will be available to request original birth certificates on June 29, 2009.

In addition, Richard Uhrlaub, Co-Director of Adoptee in Search/Colorado’s Triad Connection,  has indicated that adoptees will be able to visit the county where their adoptions were finalized and obtain their unsealed adoption records.    

OmniTrace will post additional details, as we receive them, on exact procedures to obtain your original birth certificate and Colorado adoption records. 

Once you obtain your original birth certificate and adoption records, you will still have much work to do.  At this juncture, you will likely have your birth mother’s maiden name and some background history on your birth family.  Now you will need to determine current names and addresses of your family members via, Internet research, database research and genealogical research.   Then, you will need to discreetly make contact with your birth  family members.  (It is possible that your birth mother has never told anyone about your existence.)

Please contact OmniTrace to assist you with all aspects of your search for your birth family (in Colorado or elsewhere).  Call us toll free at:  1-888-965-6696 to discuss all your options.  You can also email us at support@thesearchadvisor.com

First, visit free web resource www.zillow.com. 

1. At the top of the Zillow homepage, there is field where you can input your missing person ’s old address. 
2. After submitting your search, you will see a map of the neighborhood where your missing person once resided (you can view this map in street view, aerial view and hybrid view). 
3. The old address, that you submitted will appear, as well as tiny icons that represent homes surrounding the address you submitted. 
4. By clicking on the icons, you will obtain exact address information. 
5. Jot down the addresses surrounding your subject’s old address.  In particular, you will want the addresses on the left, on the right and directly across the street from the old address of your subject.

Then, visit free web resource www.whitepages.com. 

1. On the upper center of the home page, click on the “Reverse Lookup” tab and then in the form under the title “Reverse Address,” input the addresses you obtained at zillow.com. 
2. You will obtain the names and phone numbers of people who may have information about your missing person. 

The above search technique has an added benefit:  You can see a picture of each home in the neighborhood.  This allows you to approximately determine when the homes were built.  (No sense calling someone who has resided at an address for a short time when your missing person resided their many years ago.)

Call and interview these possible, prior neighbors who resided near your missing person’s old address.  They may be able to provide you the names of family members, church affiliations, employer information, the landlord of the property where the missing person resided, and much more. 

If you are searching for your birth mother, the above investigative trick can also help you obtain information about her–as long as you know her old address at the time you were born or adopted. 

Surprisingly, OmniTrace has many adoption related cases that includes the birth mother’s maiden name and an old address, and even when we begin a birth mother search without her name or old address, we may develop this information early on in our search.  Here’s an example:  

When we receive a search request from someone adopted in Oregon, we first help our client  obtain his or her original birth certificate (Oregon has open records).  The original certificate contains the birth mother’s maiden name (unless she was married at the time of birth) and the address where the birth mother was residing at the time of birth.

Once you have acquired a list of neighbors to interview, here a few things to remember:

• Confirm you are speaking with the correct persons listed in whitepages.com. 
• Be friendly and courteous and somewhat imploring.  You may want to represent yourself as a long lost friend or family member of the missing person.
• Make some small talk to loosen things up.
• Prepare the right questions.  Ask if they know the missing person; do they know where the missing person moved; who lived with the subject, who employed the subject, who in the neighborhood knew the subject best, etc.
• If asked how you got their phone number, say the truth:  you got their number from whitepages.com.

Recap:  If you have an old address of your missing person, interviewing prior neighbors can be a great people search resource. 

If you need additional search assistance, please leave a comment below, e-mail us at: support@thesearchadvisor.com  or call us toll free at: 1-888-965-6696. And, please contact us if you have any questions about this post.

Accessing marriage records can be very helpful when conducting a birthmother  search.   In most instances, you are trying to develop your birthmother’s married name.    

(Of course, searching marriage records can help anyone who is searching and working with only a maiden name.) 

Marriage records may contain:

• Maiden and married name of birth mother
• Dates of birth of birthmother and groom
• Date of marriage
• Place of marriage
• Birth places of birthmother and groom
• Addresses of birthmother and groom
• Parents of birthmother
• Employment information
• Religious affiliations
• Previous marriages
• Divorce information
• Relatives of birthmother and groom
• Social Security Numbers (sometimes)
• Witness names

Please note:  Information obtained from marriage records will vary greatly from state to state (e.g., one state may have employment information listed on a marriage record and another state may not).

Unfortunately, there is no available way to search marriage records nationwide.  So, you will need to have an idea where your birthmother was married in order to have a chance at accessing her records.  One way to determine where your birthmother was married is to obtain your non-identifying information.  Non-identifying information is background information on your birthmother and possibly your birthfather.  This non-id will likely provide some geographical history.  Please read our post on how to obtain non-identifying information.    

Another way to determine if and where your birthmother was married is to question your adoptive family members and see what information they can provide about her.  Please read our post on how to obtain background information on your birthmother by interviewing your adoptive family members. 

If you only know where you were born or where your birthmother was from, your search for marriage records should begin in those areas.  If you have no luck, spread your search outward. 

Typically, the county clerk’s office is the source to contact for marriage records.  There will likely be an index that you can search–perhaps a bride and groom index.  Searching these indexes can be time consuming and the records are in all types of formats.  You can get specific search instructions by contacting the county clerk’s office.  Please read our post on contacting the count clerk’s office. 

If you cannot determine where your birthmother’s marriage records are via a county search, there are also many state indexes to marriages.  These indexes are abstracts of the full marriage records kept by the counties.    

State marriage indexes–typically created and maintained by their respective state health departments–are sometimes available online.  You can see if a particular state has an online marriage record index by visiting the state web site.  The typical url format for a state website is:   www. state. xx. us (where xx is the state abbreviation).  So, as an example, if you are searching in Virgina you would input: www.state.va.us.  (This doesn’t always work,   so you might have to google around a bit to find your state website of choice. 

Many state marriage record indexes are now available via proprietary database vendors.  The geographic availability and years of availability of these indexes vary greatly.  OmniTrace    pays fees to access these indexes.  Here is a list of states we can currently search:

Alabama – Alaska – California – Colorado – Connecticut – Florida – Georgia – Idaho – Illinois – Indiana – Iowa – Kentucky – Maine – Minnesota – Missouri – Nevada – North Carolina – Ohio – Oklahoma – Rhode Island – South Dakota – Tennessee – Texas – Utah – Vermont – Virginia – West Virginia – Wisconsin

If you need help accessing a state birth index, please leave a comment below, e-mail us at: support@thesearchadvisor.com or call us toll free at:  1-888-965-6696.  And, please contact us if you have any questions about this post.

“Rachel,
 
Let me start my story by saying THANK YOU to everyone who worked on my case. On March 11 2009 at 3:00 p.m. west coast time I called her. At that initial time I was hoping to get voice mail. After 5 rings she picked up the phone and said such a sweet hello. I asked “is Elizabeth was available” she replied ” yes this is she. Who is this”  I stated “my name is” Andrea S.” excitedly she said “Is this my daughter” I replied with “is that ok ” ?  “Oh honey of course it is”! she told me.  From there on we talked for 30 min and 22 sec.  We talked the next day when she told me that she received the flowers and teddy bear i sent her from the prior day even before I made that first call.
 
March, 18 2009 at about 10:30 am we met each other in San Diego where she lives with an embrace and a few tears. From there we talked. she answered all my questions and I answered hers. I found out my medical history and that I have 2 brothers that are with her. I also found that there is 2 brothers that I have that were also given up for adoption in chicago. One boy born before me. His name at birth was shawntelle Payne (i think). Another boy after me named Emanuel Payne (again I think).  My comment to that was “awwhhh so I am your only princess.’” I had to break the ice I did not want her to feel uncomfortable. My husband and I saw a video of her parents wedding from sometime in the 30’s. we exchanged pictures and even presents. I made her a scrapbook and she gave me a journal.
 
My husband and I took her to lunch. (I have to say it was the best salad ever.) We talked a bit more and we drove her home and said our good buys.  Only to text each other the next day on our was back home to AZ.
 
I have been asked from everyone what do i do next. MY reply is to keep in-contact with each other. I also tell them that Elizabeth is never going to replace my mom and dad who raised me and gave me true life. When it comes to finding the 2 boys in chicago I would live to find them and hope i can ease them with the questions that they might have.
 
I again want to THANK YOU for everything. If there is anything I can do for you please let me know.
 
Love Always,
Andrea S.”

We want to remind you that Troy Dunn ’s The Locator TV Show has an all new episode this Saturday, March 21 at 9 pm Eastern Time / 8 pm Central Time on WE TV.

Troy Dunn has reunited thousands of birth parents and adoptee s.  The Locator TV Show will give you an inside look at what is involved with searching for your birth parents, an adoptee or a birth sibling. 

Here is an episode summary provided by the WE TV website:

“Episode Summary:  In 1985, Wendy and Christopher Radcliff’s mother, Jennifer, left them to be raised by their paternal grandparents when they were young. The brother and sister have called on Troy to locate Jennifer, who originally escaped from an abusive relationship with their father. In the next story, you’ll hear about five sisters separated since childhood. Through many years of hard work and research, the second oldest sister, Nycole, 26, made it possible for four of them to be together again, but they are all still searching for their baby sister Sarah.

The Searchers: Wendy Radcliff – Wendy and her brother have not seen or heard from their mother, Jennifer, since she put them on a plane to visit their grandparents for vacation when they were children. Nycole Kiefer – Nycole and her sister Desiree were lucky to be adopted together into a loving home, but they never forgot about their other sisters and hope to be reunited again.

The Searchees: Jennifer – It’s been 20 years since Wendy’s mother left, and she hopes she will be at a point in her life where she is ready to be reunited with her firstborn children. Sarah Martin – It will be the first time Sarah, 23, sees her mom, and the first time her mom sees all of her grown-up daughters together.”

We hope you tune in to The Locator TV Show this Saturday evening.  Perhaps you will determine that you are ready to have OmniTrace  help you find your birth parents or child given for adoption.  

Please email us at:  info@omnitrace.com or call us toll free at: 1-888-965-6696.  

By Chris Maione – Head Of OmniTrace Research Department

Our OmniTrace staff often searches Death Indexes to find living persons.  Why?  Because developing information on a deceased person can help you identify and find living family members. 

The most commonly used Death Index is the Social Security Death Index (SSDI).  The Social Security Death Index is a searchable database of over 83 million deceased individuals.  This index in maintained by the Social Security Administration (SSA) and is comprised of records from The Death Master File.

The following information is available on each decedent listed in the Social Security Death Index:

•  Last Name
•  First Name
•  Date of Birth
• Date of Death
• Social Security Number
• Last Known Residence

The Social Security Death Index is usually available for a small fee at various websites, but it also accessible, free, at http://ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com and is often searchable by the above search fields; however, access may vary depending on the website or source you are utilizing.

Please Note:  The absence of an individual in the Social Security Death Index is not proof that they are still living.  There are several reasons why someone may be missing from the index.  Listed below are some of the most common reasons:

1. An individual’s death was not reported to the Social Security Administration.
2. No death benefits were requested for the deceased individual.
3. An error was made while entering the information into the Social Security Death Index.

One interesting aspect of the Social Security Death Index is that when a person passes away their Social Security Number becomes a public record.  The main reason for this is  fraud prevention.  Fraud investigators will often utilize the Social Security Death Index to find out if a Social Security number belongs to a deceased individual.

By having someone’s Social Security Number you can determine where they were when they applied for their Social Security Number.  This can lead to your pinpointing where the decedent’s family members once lived or are currently residing.  The first three digits of individual’s Socials Security Number indicate in which state it was issued.  So having a Social Security Number can help you determine if the decedent you located is the person you are looking for.  For more information please see our prior post on:

Social Security Numbers

Once you locate a person in the Social Security Death Index you can use the Freedom of Information Act to order their Original Social Security Number Application.  The fee for this service is $27.00.

A Social Security Application may contain the following information:

• Name at time of application
• Name at birth (Maiden Name)
• Mailing address at time of application
• Date of birth
• Place of birth
• Father’s name
• Mother’s maiden name

The Social Security Death Index (SSDI) is a very powerful search tool and can help you find family members and determine their past or current whereabouts.

Are you pondering whether to retain a professional search service such as OmniTrace to locate your birth parents or adopted child? 

Perhaps reading some OmniTrace reviews and testimonials can help you make this life transforming decision:

OmniTrace Reviews and Testimonials

When you are ready, please give us a Toll Free call at 1-888-965-6696 for a free search evaluation.  Remember, you have everything to gain and nothing to lose by receiving your FREE search evalution! 

You can also email us at:   support@thesearchadvisor.com or info@omnitrace.com.  One of our search consultants:  Tatiana, Sharla, Dianne, Michelle, Barbara or Sheila will answer any questions you might have. 

For a limited time, mention that you visited our blog and receive 10% OFF your search!

Searching for your birth parents or an adopted child will be one of the most important decisions you ever make.  If you elect to use the search services of OmniTrace, we thought you would like to know a little bit about members of our staff.

We recently began writing posts about the various departments we have at OmniTrace and have begun introducing members of our staff.  You can read these posts here:

Introducing Sharla Kotler

Introducing Dianne Vassallo

 Today we would like to introduce Michele Sobel, another member of our OmniTrace Search Consultant Department.  We asked her to write a little bit about herself:

“Greetings and my name is Michele Sobel.  I was born and raised in Boston and resided in the Arizona desert for a few years before moving here to Florida where I now call home.  Since our home office is here in Florida it has been a great choice!

When I was 13 years old my beautiful baby brother had been adopted by my mother and her husband from a single mother in Texas.  We have a great friendship to this day.  Also, my biological father was adopted by my grandparents and in both cases I might add the gentlemen had great parents and upbringings.  I truly feel that if one wants to meet their biological family or even just have their medical information they should have that opportunity.  I am grateful that I can be a contributing part in helping people make contact and have their questions answered.

A personal joy of mine is regular bible study and attending several various church services weekly.  Upon my introduction to you I will be obtaining a new toy poodle shortly.  As I have mourned the passing of my fifteen year old Pomeranian last year, it now seems I am ready for a new puppy.  I have fun cooking with fresh foods daily and stay active with spin classes along with just a simply busy social calendar.  A great goal of mine is to continue hearing and witnessing the positive connections of people reuniting…..”

In future posts, we will provide biographies on all of our OmniTrace staff.  Please call or write us with any questions.  Michele and our other search consultants would love to hear from you!

 Toll Free:  1-888-965-6696
Email:  support@thesearchadvisor.com or info@omnitrace.com