Woman, 82, tracks down and meets 96-year-old birth mother

In a Jan. 15, 2016 photo provided by Kimberly Miccio, Betty Morrell, left, and her birthmother, Lena Pierce, 96, are reunited at the Greater Binghamton Airport. Morrell’s granddaughter, Kimberly Miccio, holding her own daughter, accompanied Morrell to Binghamton from Spring Hill, Fla., where they both live. Morrell had searched for 50 years for Pierce, who at age 13 was forced to give up the baby she had named Eva May. (Kimberly Miccio via AP)

By Associated Press February 5, 2016 3 min read

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) – Eighty-two years after she was born to a teenage girl and put up for adoption, Betty Morrell finally has met her 96-year-old birth mother, thanks to the dogged persistence of her granddaughter during 20 years of searching.

And as a bonus, she has forged a close friendship with a sister she never knew she had.

“After my adoptive parents died, that’s when I started looking,” Betty Morrell said Thursday by phone from her home in Spring Hill, Florida. “Being that it was a closed adoption, it’s like hitting a brick wall because you can’t get any information.”

Morrell was born in 1933 in the central New York town of Utica to Lena Pierce, who named her Eva May. Social welfare officials took the baby away because Pierce, then 13, was herself a ward of the state. Eva May was adopted by a family on Long Island and grew up as Betty Morrell, an only child.

“I grew up a very happy child,” Morrell said. “I was so content in the family I was adopted by.”