Last night my husband and I were catching up on some of our shows that DVR each week. With two small children it is nearly impossible to watch some shows when they are on. Last nights lucky winner was NCIS: Los Angeles.
The main character in the show, G Callen, has had a storyline about his family over the last couple of seasons. What the G stands for is one of the mysteries, everyone just calls him Callen. In the last couple of episodes, most of his family history has been revealed. He found out that his mother was killed in Romania when he was a young boy and that her name was Clara. Clara had been born in Romania to a Romanian woman and a U.S. CIA operative after WWII. She had immigrated to the United States with her mother after the father was killed in Romania. Clara had been recruited by the CIA and returned to Romania as a young woman. She had two children in the 6 years she was in Romania. At the end of the episode we watched last night, Callen was asking his boss, Hettie, how he and his sister arrived in the United States after their mother was killed in Romania. She replied that no one knows. All she knew was they appeared 2 years after the mother was killed. Callen then asked Hettie if she knew who his father was. Hettie replied that the CIA was unable to answer that question when they tried to find out.
My genealogy brain immediately said “Well, they did not do a very good job then. There are so many record types that they probably missed. You don’t just have two children and leave no records during 6 years that might indicate who the father was. I would have started with finding Clara’s address and interviewing her neighbors. There also had to be hospital records, civil registrations, etc. I bet they did not use the A to Z method of breaking brick walls.”
I know it is a TV show but part of me wanted to jump on the Internet last night and see what types of records are available in Romania. I can’t wait to see what NCIS: Los Angeles comes up with down the line. I am sure there will be some small piece of information that appears to start a story arc about finding Callen’s father.
