COEUR d'ALENE - On Father's Day in 1977, Bill Crawford's dad sat him down and told him he and his older sister were adopted at birth.

It was the first time Crawford, then 32, had ever heard the story.

His mother went to her grave with the information. She did not want the children to know they were adopted. But when she died, Crawford's father, William Sr., felt free to tell his kids.

"And that was fine because they had raised me with a lot of love and care," Crawford said. "I was OK with that. They were still my mom and dad. They were still the ones that raised me and I think my birth mother made sure of that because she went and lived with my adoptive parents while she was carrying me."

After learning the news, Crawford said he let it settle for a year before becoming curious about just who his birth parents were.

"I joined an adoption group and it was very helpful in getting the initial information I needed, like my birth certificate and the edited adoption papers," Crawford said.

But he kept running into a roadblock in his search because his birth mother was suspected of falsifying information on the paperwork. He had a name, a birthday and a birthplace for the woman, but no way of knowing if any of it was true.

His luck changed in 2012, when he told his adoption story to Nancy Beyer, a friend he had known through church for four years.

Beyer said she was always interested in genealogy and had helped others find classmates and trace their family history using Internet resources.

But she had never attempted to locate someone's birth family.

"I was immediately intrigued with the story," Beyer said. "I wanted to try to help."

Beyer began her efforts by showing Crawford and his wife how to use an Internet ancestry database at the Coeur d'Alene Library, but they quickly realized the information given by Crawford's birth mother was false.

"I continued the search using the documents Bill got from the agency and kept coming up against the same brick wall," Beyer said. "There was just nothing out there."

It wasn't until April 2013, when Beyer came across a book written by Richard Hill called "Finding Family," that the brick wall came crumbling down. Hill was able to find his birth parents through DNA testing and Beyer said she was fascinated with the story.

"I sent the story to Bill and told him he had to try it," Beyer said. "He eventually did and one of his closest matches was predicted to be a first or second cousin. That's how DNA works, they don't give you an exact relationship but they give you a range of what the relationship could be."

She decided to take a course on analyzing DNA information and said her instructor saw the data, with the link to a possible cousin, and told Beyer she was onto something.

"The instructor told us we needed to go after this man and look at him as if he were Bill's father's first cousin," Beyer said. "That meant we had to find out who all of the man's first cousins were. We found out he had 27."

The plan was to start examining each first cousin individually until they found a match amongst the 27 individuals. Beyer started with the first two people in order to show Crawford how to properly analyze the data.

"He did two and asked me to check his work to make sure he was right before he kept going," Beyer said.

When she examined Crawford's work she realized that the first person he analyzed was his father. Beyer said since she had more experience with ancestry and DNA she was able to see links that Crawford never could have seen.

"That led me to find a grave memorial to a woman named Grace," Beyer said. "I found a blog written in tribute to Grace by her niece and was only really looking at it because it was interesting. At the bottom was Grace's obituary and I noticed the birthplace was the same as what the mother wrote in the adoption paperwork."

At that point Beyer knew they had found Crawford's mother, and from the obituary, they learned that Grace was later married to Crawford's birth father. The couple went on to have five more children, which meant Crawford had five siblings.

"When she found them she sent me a text telling me to check my email," Crawford said. "I opened my email and immediately saw my mother's picture and just lost it."

Crawford tried to call Beyer but was too emotional to talk so he turned the phone over to his wife.

"It was just overwhelming," Crawford said. "I was choked up."

He decided to send a letter to all five of his newly found siblings in the hope that they would be open to a reunion. Beyer helped him write the letter and said the biggest part they tried to convey was that Crawford wasn't looking for anything other than a meeting.

On Jan. 3, 2014, Crawford was united with his five siblings because of the letter. He said it was a very emotional meeting - with everyone involved hugging, crying and trying to absorb it all.

"I had spent 35 years searching," Crawford said. "It was like I got a family for Christmas."

The process of locating Crawford's birth parents and siblings is one that formed a lasting friendship between Crawford and Beyer. Crawford said Beyer has forever changed his life.

"She's like my sister - she's touched me so deeply by grabbing onto this and running with it," Crawford said. "At times when I was coasting, she would push me forward. It's been awesome and I am so blessed."

Beyer said she had trouble putting into words what the search has meant to her.

"But I can say it's the highlight of my hobby," Beyer said. "And I think it always will be."