IN MEMORIAM

Annette Baran, author & crusader for open adoption passed away at 83

On behalf of the AAC membership, we offer our heartfelt and deepest sympathy to Annette Baran’s family and friends during this time of great loss.  We want to acknowledge Ms. Baran’s gifts of understanding, advocacy, and support to our membership over the years. 

Annette was a clinical social worker, psychotherapist and crusader for open adoption.  One of the first social workers to recognize that secrecy in adoption was damaging, she became a fierce advocate for open adoption and adult adoptees’ right to access their own birth information. In 1978, she co-authored The Adoption Triangle, the first book to suggest opening sealed adoption records.  Eleven years later she co-authored another pioneering work, Lethal Secrets, which explored the impact of secrecy in the world of donor conception.

Her research and work radically altered how adoption was practiced and considered in the United States and around the world.  AAC members were privileged to call her a friend, mentor, and advocate.  Adoptees and birth parents everywhere benefited from her wisdom and insight into human nature.