Fake birth mother name?

Has anyone managed to get their records unsealed, only to not be able to find any historical trace of the mother's name? How often--with regard to private adoptions--do you suppose women altered their name?

It depends on the era and who handled the adoption. In the 1950's there were many sketchy (black market / grey market) adoptions. Later it would have been still fairly easy because no one asked for id back then. Did you get your records unsealed in NY? Kind regards, Dickons

My relative was surrendered in 1946, and it was done through Bronx Surrogate Court. There was a lawyer involved, a psychiatrist involved (he had a therapy clinic, but also was peripherally involved in the entertainment world) and the requisite investigator. Could be straightforward, could be gray market -- I could make a case for both. Can I provide any other information? Besides the fact that we've scoured genealogical data for years and not been able to find the "right" woman who fits the name and age profile. Her occupation is listed as "photographer's model" and I was recently able to figure out that the address she gave was for a photographer who had a studio there. For reasons I won't get into here, it's highly unlikely the psychiatrist or photographer were the father.

If you haven't tried it yet - have a subscription to ancestry and could search if you pm'd me the name. Kind regards, Dickons

Thank you very, very much. I do have one, and have searched exhaustively. I have even written descendents of similarly-sounding names and disproved those as well. I just wondered if--all things being equal--a woman would choose to use the same false name on the birth certificate, adoption papers, etc. when it was a sealed adoption. No one could have known that fifty or fifty-five years later, a legal proceeding let my relative unseal it. Thank you again.

Jbricklin, Do a dna test and go from there. Do the most marker test you can to give you better results. Then search the surname groups. It will give you an answer of yes or no... Kind regards, Dickons

Yes, indeed! Uploaded to Gedmatch and closest match so far is at least 4.2 generations away, but always watching the updates and crawling through the trees! Thanks for your encouragement.

Don't limit yourself to just one website. 23andme, ancestry - can you upload the results to them? You could also try asking for a Search Angel (think there is a subforum with that in the name). Sometimes they find the impossible. Kind regards, Dickons

Thanks, Dickons. I think I am the search angel :-) "Gedmatch" is great in that it is a free, volunteer-based site that takes the data generated by 23andMe, Ancestry.com etc. and lets you compare it to that uploaded by customers from all those major DNA companies. So instead of having just one company's population to compare it to, you can have up to four. I think I just have to be patient, but I have been searching for so long. I greatly appreciate your input.

Have you checked the 1940 census to see if a girl of that name and age exists? Also, as you have no doubt discovered, because many birthmothers marry, then it can be hard finding them under their maiden name. What does help is if there is a first and middle name. I found my bmother (or rather found a grave) by googling her first and middle names in inverted commas, eg "Mary Louise" and then her maiden name separately. Obviously, some combinations are more common that others (luckily my birthmother's name wasn't as common as Mary Louise). As for changing names, I have heard of that happening, especially if the grandparents are involved. I've heard of people using friend's names. I did think that could be a possibility with my own birthmother but I think my relatives and I seem sure now that their relative is my birthmother. *If* I were my own birthmother and didn't want to be found but didn't want to straight out lie, what I would have done is just use my first name and surname and then say I was from the nearest big city to my own town (my bmother was from a small town). For example, Mary Louise Smith from Small Town NY state might become Mary Smith from the Bronx, NY. So it is a possibility that your birthmother may have used her real name but perhaps chosen a different town to one where she was originally from. Also, in regards to newspapers, there is a historical Google Newspaper service that not many people realise still exists, one can't find via a normal Google Archive search. Unfortunately, it is not searchable, the papers can only be browsed: [url=http://www.theancestorhunt.com/1/post/2014/01/google-news-archive-list-of-all-newspapers.html#.Usyp0fRDvZV]Google News Archive - List of All Newspapers - The Ancestor Hunt[/url] Actual link: [url=http://news.google.com/newspapers]Google News Archive Search[/url] Despite only being able to browse the newspapers, I did find it helpful in my own search (which I won't go into here).

Thank you. Yes, Census records were my default and first line of inquiry. The natural mother gave birth in New York; her place of birth was Michigan - no town mentioned. Making all of this so frustrating is that we have the complete file - - pages and pages and pages of lawyer-speak and names -- but nothing that would help narrow further, like a middle name or initial. We can try to infer some things: the adoption was private and not through a home, so probably truthful that she was 22 as it says on the papers; probably wasn't completely convinced adoption way to go (didn't surrender until eleven days after the birth, said my friend's adoptive parents); and the psychiatrist involved wasn't cheap, although he was sleazy in ways I won't get into here. I have even searched with just the last name, wondering if she used her real middle name as her first. She did not attend any legal meetings after leaving the hospital, but that's not unusual for that time.

This collection of resources may be of use for future reference: [url]https://familysearch.org/search/collection/list[/url] Note that each state of the US has separate resources listed.

That is exactly what happened to me.

I was born in NYC in Sept of 1945 and adopted 6 days later. Through several dna tests, I found my blood family and identified my birth mother. My research showed that I was a black market baby and the name on my recently obtained original birth certificate was misrepresented to show I was born of a Jewish mother. I was adopted by a Jewish family in NJ. This was common practice back then and in 1950 several people were indicted and convicted; including the agency that handled my adoption. DNA results showed I have no Eastern European or Jewish DNA; I'm actually half Greek and 40 percent Scotch/Irish.Bob