Georgie passed away on 16 July 2014 at the impressive age of 100, having made a huge contribution to the work of adoption professionals, and to the searches of adopted people, birth relatives and adoptive families.

After a prominent 40-year long career in the probation service Georgie came to BAAF as a volunteer in the 1980s, initially helping people to trace their records, and then compiling the first directory on the location of adoption records. This one-page 1st edition grew over the years, to become a 202 page volume when it was last published in 2001, and was the go-to source for adoption counsellors. It offered comprehensive details on all known mother and baby homes and closed/open adoption agencies and social services departments that had been involved in placing children for adoption, and pointed searchers to the latest location of surviving records about those adoptions.

Despite the success of the printed directory, Georgie had always believed that the directory would work best as an electronic database and in 2006 her vision was realised when the Adoption Search Reunion website was created. As well as providing information about recent changes in Adoption legislation, the website included a searchable database called 'Locating Adoption Records' which included and built upon the information that Georgie had been gathering since the 1980s. A Parliamentary reception was held at the House of Commons in May 2006 to celebrate the official launch of the Adoption Search and Reunion website, and we were delighted that Georgie was able to attend alongside MPs, BAAF patron Nicky Campbell, and adopted adults who have themselves undertaken searches for their birth families.

Georgina Margaret Stafford
27 October 1913 - 16 July 2014