what do you do if you have no extra money, limited information, and no blessings? how do you go about finding a person youve never met before? this is important to me. i was hoping maybe someone here has tried locating a person at one time or another and could maybe give me some ideas
That would probably depend on how much information you do have. First/Last name? Names of family members? Location where they live? I could help you, most likely, but need a little more info.
all i have is a first and last name, know that during the late 70s was stationed in texas, and is from concord, nc. if its not obvious, im looking for my biological father. im 23 and ive never met him, never seen a pic of him, dont know anything about him. my mom is no help. if you can even give me some idea to do a search, id be forever grateful.
Well - you used the word “stationed” so I’d start with the military, VA, or similar. That would eliminate a huge amount of same-names right off.
One of these worked for me.
First of all, you can try looking in the public records for Concord. You can peruse the tax records for Carrabus County here:
http://co.cabarrus.nc.us/TaxScroll/Resident_AddressSearch.asp
You might also check in Texas, where he was stationed to see if he owned any property. You didn’t mention a city, but most county websites have links to tax and property searches. Many more, including Volusia County (where you live), have online public record searches as well. Typically these search pages are hosted by the County Clerk or Clerk of the Court for the respective county. I did not find a link at the Carrabus county site, but I did send an e-mail asking about it. When I get a response I’ll post it.
Similarly, you can check sites like www.classmates.com if you know what high school he attended. Long shot, but certainly worth a few minutes of your time. It’s possible he registered.
This site, http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/all-search.html?Welcome=1023996912 looks okay, but I think parts of it cost money. There are a couple of articles that give tips on finding people.
Hope this helps. If it does, I prefer Newcastle in the bottle, and you can buy me one.
Try the Internet.
type his name into
www.google.com
You may get lucky. Try the image search, because that leads to personal webpages more often–i.e. his picture may be linked to his name. Remember to type in all the information you have, both together, separately, & in various orders.
Try newspaper archives. Most small-town papers list the occasion of somebody completing Basic Training. If you know his hometown, this helps.
Try the archives of the paper where he was stationed.
Your birth certificate may help with more data.
If his name is distinctive, try the on-line Yellow Pages for his hometown. He may have relatives there that can help. A few well-placed phone calls could wrap things up.
California’s driver’s licenses are a publically available database. He may have moved there.
If you can afford it, buy an on-line credit check. That should work.
There is a service called Lexis-Nexis that is pretty useful too, but it is a pay service that is several hundred dollars/ month. I have access through work and you may find that your public library (and certainly many university libraries) have free access. If you could provide me some information off-line, I could probably run a quick search for you. It will basically search all the world’s major newspapers, magazines, trade journals, etc, as well as public records for a name. This is an especially useful source for people with unusual first or last names. If you’re looking for “John Smith”, you’re screwed.
Carabus coutny does not currently have public records available for Internet searches, but you can call the county clerk (they didn’t give the number, being government employees) and request an information search. Printouts of results are $5.00 per page.