City directories will likely be something that you become very familiar with in the course of your search. At this point, you will likely need to use them to find out more about the doctor that delivered you, the attorney that your parents used, the agency that handled the adoption, or the hospital where you were born. City Directories are a lot like phone books. They contain listings of businesses and individuals, their addresses, and their phone numbers, and are bound by city, or groups of towns, or regions. These books are usually hardbound and can be found in university and public libraries for surrounding areas, usually from about 1930 forward, but often much earlier. City directory listings contain more than phone books do, however, such as occupations, places of employment, and the names of others living in the same household, such as spouse or adult children. They can be used to trace a listing for a doctor to find out when s/he retired if s/he has, or where they are now located or now practicing. Likewise with an attorney. Also, if your adoptive parents are not able to come up with the name of the agency they used, city directories will list all the agencies in a given area at the time of your birth, which you can then contact. Usually there were just a handful. Finally, city directories can be used to find out if the hopsital where you were born is still around or if another hospital is now located at the same address. Again, utilize your friendly research librarian or volunteer search buddy if you do not live in the area of your search.

11) Miscellany

You are now at the point where you might be in need of specific tricks of the trade that only insiders will be able to supply you with unless you happen to stumble onto some of your own. There are certain search techniques and documents that I have left out of this post and are in general kept quiet by members of the searching community, as we have had the painful experience of having these resources shut down once they have become known. I have included other sources here, reluctantly, balancing the importance of having searchers know about them with the risks that are always involved when a search resource becomes public. Please utilize your judgement in making certain search tricks and resources known to others, particularly on the Internet. A homepage detailing your search and including the news that there's a big leather book sitting on the desk of a particular courthouse where they forgot to delete all the adoption entries, for instance, or finding an Family History Center that has a copy of birth index that can't be found anywhere else, is usually not a good idea. If you have follwed the advice in this post and the previous one,delved further into the resources listed, and made use of the mailing lists, local search groups, and publications, you should be well equipped to complete this phase of your search. Further posts will cover what to do once you have a name to work with, telling your adoptive family about the search, hiring a searcher and/or intermediary, and preparation for contact. Comments, additions, criticism, and corrections to this post are welcome.

Continue to the next section, I have a name! Uh, now what?

This post was authored by Shea Grimm except where otherwise indicated. It may be copied and distributed freely, in whole or part, as long as it is not sold, and as long as this notice is kept intact.