Getting in contact with a long lost friend

Friends Forever:It's hard getting in contact with a long lost friend, especially if it's been years of no contact and no communication between other friends or family members on each side. However, there is a key phrase in finding that one person you cared about in the past, "Don't give up on searching."
== Steps ==
#  Think and try to remember their first and possibly their middle name(s). This is your starting point. The last name may be tricky in some situations, as they might be married, divorced, or adopted and have changed it since you last saw them. They might be certain people that have paid to legally change their first and last names with the government, as this route would be impossible to track down only using the bare essentials of finding someone. Note down everything you can remember about your friend such as Date of Birth, middle initial even their hobbies and interests as this may give you a successful lead in tracking them down.{{largeimage|FindOldFriend Step 1.jpg}}
# Get in contact with other people that knew the specific person you're searching for. Ask them questions about when they've last seen them, talked to them, or any personal information like last known email addresses or phone numbers. Just be advised that they might not give such information out, due to (the friend's) preference. Sounds obvious but it's also worth combing your address book to see if you have written down any connections to them that you have forgotten about.{{largeimage|FindOldFriend Step 3.jpg}}
#  Browse on Facebook to see if they hold an account. You can search by school, name, or email address. Browsing can be filtered by age groups, height, number of kids, gender, distance of postal code areas, and other useful information. Other social networking sites such as Myspace and Bebo are also other excellent sources to find old friends. Also consider looking at LinkedIn which is a professional contact network.{{largeimage|FindOldFriend Step 4.jpg}}
#  Search on the free people search engines such as http://find-people-free-search.com. This can save you money and provide you with a lot of relevant information.{{largeimage|FindOldFriend Step 5.jpg}}
#  Post a message on a free friend-finder board. These sites are message boards that are moderated by "search angels" or volunteers with special people search tools. Put in a request and they'll go looking for you. An example of a free forum is http://consumer-warning.org/lost-friends-board.{{largeimage|FindOldFriend Step 6.jpg}}
#Search Interest, Hobby and Occupation Relevant Websites. At the start of this article, noting down your friend's hobbies and interests was mentioned. Looking on the internet there are forums and websites dedicated to a whole host of clubs, societies and interests. Then as well as using lost friend bulletin boards, if you have a rough idea of the person's location and what they like to do, try to find a web site related to that topic.  Similarly your friend's occupation might also give you a lead, there are bulletin boards and forums related to different professions from nursing through to ex forces personnel so that is another area where you could consider looking.
#Use the Electoral Roll. For those in the UK, I am unsure of the system in the US, carrying out an electoral search is the next best step if you have exhausted the resources listed above. There are three ways you can search the electoral roll.To do it for free, you have to physically go to the council offices and look through the electoral register. The other two ways require you to pay for an external company to do the work for you. It will either be in the format of a premium pay phone number where someone searches whilst you are on the phone or where you submit your details, pay a one off fee and then they contact you with the results. For a one off electoral roll search do not pay more than £5. A review of electoral roll search services is provided .
#Do Some Background Reading.

== Tips ==
*Try signing up and joining facebook groups of your old schools or search for your friends on it!
*If you are looking for an old friend  there are cost effective professional services that will find your old friend for you. If you want to find them yourself then consider using marriage records. If your old friend is a woman then it can help to know where she married and what her new name is.
*There are various services for locating people, if you do decide to use a professional service to find an old friend make sure it is specific to the county you are in and the county the person you are looking for lives in.
*For some high school graduations, pamphlets list what colleges or scholarships students are planning to attend or have achieved. Using that, you'll have more of a general idea of where people are.

== Warnings ==
*Expect different reactions; as they might have had a grudge on you from past experiences and may have disconnected the friendship for a reason, they might have wanted to move on from the past and wouldn't consider rekindling a friendship now, or they might just become your friend or best friend again.
*There is a big Classmates.com warning about memberships. Once you pay for membership, it automatically goes as auto-renewal and it is known as one of the hardest subscriptions to get out of.
== Sources and Citations ==
*[http://www.classmates.com Classmates.com]
*[http://www.myspace.com Myspace Homepage]
*[http://www.facebook.com Facebook Homepage]
Have fun and good lucky.

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