KATHLEEN RENEE CARMAN (1972-2025)

Back in 2022, I answered a post in an adoption newsgroup.  Someone named Kathy was looking for her birth parents.  She had done Ancestry DNA and was quick to share her list with me.  Kathy was born and adopted in Florida in 1972.  Unlike many of my searches, Kathy had very clear and easy to understand DNA matches.  Finding her birth parents was a piece of cake.  What we found out about her birth family was the exciting part.  We kept finding more and more information about her parents and grandparents.  It was all very shocking.  We also had some interaction with family members that did not go well.

Kathy's birth mom was also named Kathleen.  It's very likely she was named after her.  I'm tempted to reveal the mother's full name and show a photo, and I know Kathy would love it if I did.  There's a reason I'm keeping it a secret.  I'll get to that in a moment.  Kathy's birth mom was from a wealthy family from New York.  Her parents (Kathy's maternal grandparents) owned a chain of popular stores which are still around today.  They had a house in the Hamptons and were very well off.  It was confusing at first because Kathy was born in Florida.  We later discovered Kathleen's family had a home there as well, and she also did some traveling to California.

Kathleen had another daughter later in life.  We'll call her Karen.  Karen is Kathy's half-sister, and she was contacted.  Karen wanted nothing to do with any of this.  In fact, she insisted that the DNA must be wrong and there's no way that her mother secretly had a child that was put up for adoption.  Kathy had quite an attitude and was pissed off that Karen wouldn't even acknowledge her existence.  We found other relatives willing to talk to Kathy and they even knew that Kathleen had given up a child.  So, Karen was clearly lying and knew about this all along.  I'm sure the family still has some wealth today.  I'm guessing Karen didn't want a strange new family member around.  She probably thought Kathy was after money.

This is where the story takes an interesting and disturbing turn.  Kathy's birth father is not at all someone you'd expect to be involved with Kathleen.  He was arrested many times throughout his life.  His crimes usually involved theft, but his most serious crime was... MURDER.  In 1973 he went to prison for shooting an elderly woman in the back twice with a shot gun.  He later escaped from prison and attempted to stab a police officer with a hunting knife when he was recaptured.  I'll include some newspaper clippings below.  There's actually many more than the ones I've included.  Donald Darcy died homeless in 2006.

Don Darcy's mother (Kathy's grandmother) also had and interesting life.  She was born, Ruby Juanita Lamb.  Her name was later changed to her step father's name, Smith.  Ruby was a beauty queen who was a former "Miss California."  She competed in the Miss America Pageant in 1927, as well as many other pageants.  There are hundreds of newspaper clippings out there about Ruby.  She was quite famous in the late 1920s.  I'll include several clips, photos, and even an old video we found.  A family member also told us she once dated actor Buddy Epson.  He was well known in the 1960s and 70s for starring in popular TV shows like the Beverly Hillbillies.

Kathy's grandfather was completely unknown to anyone until I uncovered a secret from long ago using my DNA knowledge.  Ruby had a set of twins.  Donald Darcy and his twin sister.  There was some speculation about who the father of the twins was.  Their father was thought to be one of Ruby's husbands, Edward Darcy or Morris Rosen.  Instead, Kathy has DNA matches to a completely different family, and they are easy to understand.  Her grandfather was a man named Joseph Edgar Meador.  I was able to find very little information about Joseph, but I did find a family member who didn't speak highly of him.  Apparently, he was a womanizer, drunk, and just a bad dude.

Here's something fun I discovered.  Ruby Smith's mother's name was Viola Skaggs.  As a joke, Kathy said to me, "Wouldn't it be funny if we found out I was related to Boz Scaggs?"  I laughed and said, "Well, I doubt it, the last names aren't even spelled the same."  Just for fun I decided to look at Boz Scaggs' family.  He was originally from the mid-west.  Viola Skaggs was also.  Then, I also noticed "Scaggs" was originally spelled "Skaggs."  I traced both families back several generations.  To make a long story short, Kathy really is a distant cousin of Boz Scaggs.  Boz had several hit songs in the 1970s and 80s.  Even if you're too young to recognize his name, chances are you've heard several of his songs.  I'll include some videos below.