An Online Conversation Course with lawyer Gregory Luce, genealogist Melanie McComb, and author Gabrielle Glaser
Moderator: TV host and author Bill Griffeth
Live Panel Discussion: November 15, 2021, 6:00-7:30 PM EST
Access to course materials and pre-program recordings starting November 8
Over the past several decades, the dynamics of adoption and access to its critical records have shifted dramatically. Our society’s move toward greater openness and advances of DNA have changed the landscape for families and researchers. State by state, the laws are different: in some, secrecy still controls; in others, birth records are available to adoptees on request. Across the country, individuals are being reunited with their biological families.
This online conversation course brings together professionals from a variety of fields to discuss approaches to researching adoptions (both historical and current day), current and coming legislation, and new techniques for connecting with living family members and broadening your family tree. The panelists will also share instructive and inspiring stories, some of them personal, about the search for knowledge. Through a combination of instructive videos, educational resources, and a lively panel discussion, this unique course will give you the traction and tools you need to further your own research.
This online seminar includes:
- Access to more than two hours' worth of instructive videos, plus downloaded slides, handouts, and other educational materials (below and to the side);
- 90-minute live conversation and Q&A with our panel of experts (a recording of this discussion will be posted here following the live broadcast);
- Access to all course materials and unlimited replay of all videos
RECORDINGS
Live Panel Discussion, November 15, 2021
Perspective from Genealogist Melanie McComb
History of Adoption in America: Resources and Strategies for Researching Adopted Ancestors
Running Time: 46:37
Perspective from Journalist and Author Gabrielle Glaser
Running Time: 1:02:03
(Broadcast: June 15, 2021)
Perspective from Adoption Lawyer Gregory Luce
Personal Truth, Collective Fiction, and the United States of Secrecy
Running Time: 1:02:03
HANDOUTS
A History of Adoption in America
Adoption Rights Law Center selected slides
OTHER MATERIALS
Archived American Inspiration event: Gabrielle Glaser with American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption (broadcast: June 15, 2021)
BOOKS
The Girls Who Went Astray: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade by Ann Fessler
American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption by Gabrielle Glaser
The Stranger in My Genes: A Memoir by Bill Griffeth
ABOUT OUR PANELISTS
Gregory D. Luce is a Minnesota-based attorney and a DC-born adoptee.
He is the founder of Adoptee Rights Law Center and the president of Adoptees United Inc.
He is a graduate of Boston University and the University of Minnesota Law School, where he was awarded the
Justitia Award for the most promising graduate of the law class of 1993.
Melanie McComb, Genealogist, assists library visitors, both on-site and online, with their family history research.
She is an international lecturer who teaches on a variety of topics. Melanie holds a B.S. degree from the State University of
New York at Oswego. Her areas of research interest include Irish genealogy, DNA, Atlantic Canada, Jewish genealogy,
military records, and historical adoptions.
Gabrielle Glaser is a New York Times bestselling author and journalist whose work on mental health, medicine,
and culture has been published in The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times,
among other publications. She has appeared on many national radio and television programs, including NPR’s Fresh Air, All Things Considered,
NBC’s Nightly News, and ABC’s World News Tonight. Her most recent book is American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption.
Moderator Bill Griffeth covered Wall Street for almost 40 years. In 2019 he retired from day-to-day anchoring duties at CNBC
and became an Anchor-At-Large. Among many awards, he was nominated for six Cable ACE awards as Best News Anchor. Bill is the
author of numerous books including Have At It, Sister (an Audible True Crime Original to be released next year) and The Stranger in My Genes;
its highly-anticipated sequel, Strangers No More, will be published in the spring of 2022, also by American Ancestors.