Amy Scott, photographed at the offices of Bethany Christian Services on Thursday, Mar. 24, 2016, in Chattanooga, Tenn., has been the executive director of the organization since December. Amy Scott always knew she was adopted.
Her parents had already adopted two other children before she came into their home in Texas as an infant in 1976. Several years ago, she remembers, her mom mentioned that she had been abandoned but offered no more details.
It wasn’t until three years ago, when she was 37 and working as an adoption counselor for Bethany Christian Services in Chattanooga, that she decided to try to track down the details of her birth.
“I had a curiosity to know more about my circumstances,” Scott says, “and working in the field I work in, I had an understanding how to research those things.”
She called the newspaper in the West Texas town of Big Springs, where she knew she had been born, and asked if they had any stories in their archives about an abandoned infant from the week of her birthday. They did, but it would cost her $4 to get a copy and, no, they didn’t take credit cards over the phone. So Scott mailed a check and waited until the package arrived in the mail.