The new year is a time of mixed emotions for people who celebrated the holidays but then paused wistfully to wonder what ever happened to friends, relatives
and lovers who vanished from their lives years ago.
The Internet, however, is making it possible to reconnect with lost acquaintances. In fact, several free computer search services say there was a startling increase in December in the number of attempts to trace the missing.
“December is when we notice a lot of people looking for people,” says Naveen Jain of the InfoSpace Web site, one of the first to integrate telephone numbers and names with e-mail addresses and even maps showing where hundreds of millions of people are located in North America and Europe.
“They feel lonely. They are missing someone. In November, about 5 million people visited our site. (In December), it jumped to 7 million. We monitor this traffic, we see the messages they post. These are middle-aged people looking for old friends, ex-girlfriends, someone from their younger days.”
Here is a message from Victor D’Allesandro of North Miami:
“Does anyone know Lilly Marcovic of Chicago? We were high school prom dates at Waukegan High in 1955. I believe she studied medicine. We had some real good laughs. She was quite a gal.”
Or a thank you note from Pete Cochran of Pembroke Pines, Fla., to Lycos PeopleFind: “Last night I went looking for my friend Steve Bishop who was in the Army with me in Korea. Thirty minutes later we were on the phone together. We were both in tears.”
More than a dozen Web-based directories are available at no cost because they are supported by advertising.
Increasingly sophisticated and now sometimes incorporating phone books and other data from countries as far away as Japan, Australia and Belgium, they typically ask users for the first and last names of the person they are seeking, and a city and state if known. A search may result in a handful or dozens of “hits,” or it may be right on target, resulting in easy phone or mail contact.
Some find the e-mail address of the person if there is one. Some will search for a name and location on the strength of just a phone number, or will even search an entire country using just a surname.
A site operated by National Association of Investigative Specialists for private investigators may provide more information on a person than a friend should know.
Another service, CPEQ, a Tampa-based Internet provider (www.cpeq.com/wall) offers an on-line search directory geared to Vietnam veterans who want to find other vets, or the surviving family members of fellow GIs killed in the war.
In addition, some CD-ROM-based software is available. Phone-Search USA 2.0, for example, which retails for $29.95, contains data on 98 million households and businesses.
Donn Paul, 62, of Celina, Ohio, using PhoneSearch, says he was able to help an English woman he met on a cruise find her father, whom she had not heard from in 50 years but who turned out to be living in Maine. This inspired him to look — so far unsuccessfully — for Clyde Wilson, last heard of in New Mexico when they went through Air Force flight training together in the early 1950s.
“You just want to compare notes after all these years,” Paul says. “You start hearing all those Christmas carols and getting weepy-eyed. I don’t know what it is, but the feeling is a powerful one.”
Jack Sulzberger, a member of a Ft. Lauderdale computer club for seniors, says searches for old pals often result in delightful reunions.
“I have had encounters I still haven’t stopped talking about,” he says about these emotional contacts.
“Sometimes, though, you find out someone is dead, or is in jail, or worse. Or you call and there’s a wife or a widow and the `no good so and so’ ran off from her or something. You gotta be prepared for that.
“But when you make that call and you say, `Hi, is this Joe?,’ and the voice at the other end says it is and then there’s this moment when he realizes who it is, that is something.
“Twenty, 30 years, you have not seen or heard from that guy and suddenly you are reunited. It’s like those years did not exist. He’s telling you things about yourself you had forgotten. You’re a kid again. Some Christmas present!”
