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Over-the-counter DNA tests can find biological links.

F~ACertificate - Y-DNA

Instead of encountering a superstar phi­losophy professor or symphony conduc­tor, they found a man who livesin a trailerand supports himself doing odd jobs.

And what about the donor's currentfamily? Not all donors' wives are pleasedwhen they find out about other children.Some understandably feel threatened.

So fur, none of the Baylor donors whohave undergone paternity tests haveproved to be LaBounty's biological father.But even when connections are made, noteveryone proceeds with the same speed,desire or levelof interest. One donor wroteon the donor-sibling website, "I floodedmy biological daughter with photos of meand her cousins and grandparents. Butjust as an example, last night, as I wassending off a quick e-mail to her, my wifereminded me that my son was upstairsvegging out on the Discovery Channel

instead of brushing his teethand reading. The clear implica­tion is that time taken to interactwith donor-insemination kids istime taken away from the regu­lar kids, and I parent them lessbecause of it. It's a rearrange­ment of the social order to haverelationships established thislate in life."

Kirk Maxey, president of achemical company, served as adonor for more than a decadeat the behest of his then wife,a nurse. Happily married withchildren of his own, he reachedout to two daughters he createdthrough sperm donation. Andnow he's helping other donors.He has created a nonprofitgenetic-testing center wheredonors and children of donors

can have their blood tested for geneticmarkers to see if they match. He is alsopushing for lawsthat would allowchildrento learn the identity of their donor, evenifhe had been promised anonymity. Suchlaws already exist in Sweden, Germany,the Netherlands, New Zealand and theU.K. In early 2009 a Missouri lawmakerintroduced a bill that would allowchildrenof sperm donors to learn the donor's iden­tity when they reach the age of 18.

As a result of this social movement,American donors are preparing to dealwith paternity tests that finger them asfuthers and potential lawsthat may identifYthem to their donor children. A Califor­nia doctor who created 33 donor childrenwhile in medical school has rewritten hiswill. If his donor children sue his estateafter he dies, they will each get $1. Whileit's a lot less than he received for the con­tents ofthat little plastic cup, it's still a lotmore than he ever bargained for.

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Men usually donate sperm when theyare young and haven't had childrenthemselves. Later, when they marry andbecome fathers, some begin to wonderwhat happened to their other children.

And who wouldn't want a beautiful, tal­ented daughter like Kathleen LaBountywithout having to go through the stages ofcolic, potty training, second-grade recitalsand driver's ed? But would donor 401 ofVirginia be equally welcoming if26 youngoffspring showed up at his doorstep?

The tens of thousands of men whoserve as sperm donors each year may soonhave to come to grips with those questions.Consumers' demand for more informationas they choose donors may make track­ing them easier. While LaBounty knowsonly the date and place of the spermdonation, women seeking sperm donorstoday receive anywhere from five to 20

pages of information about each potentialdonor. Although donor 1049's name is notincluded in his profile, a clinic's entry onhim includes a photo showing a clean-cut,cute Californian. He sayshe's a member ofthe Clean Oceans Campaign and the Surf­rider Foundation. He describes himself as"secure, sensitive, innovative, intelligent,creative, thoughtful, ambitious, competi­tive, respectful, comedic and optimistic."His SAT score is 1355. His 54-year-oldmother is a healthy, intelligent and adven­turous painter who wears reading glasses.His brother is a developer, he adds. Howhard would it be to track down this man?

Searching is not without risk. JeffreyHarrison, a hot catch as donor 150 in thelate 1980s, was described on his donorform as a blue-eyed, six-foot-talliover ofphilosophy and music. Three years agotwo of his sperm-donor children, daugh­ters born into different families, foundeach other and began their search for him.

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a unique family reunion where the chil­dren, who are half siblings, can get toknow one another. It's only a matter oftime, though, before one of the womenor children decides to find donor 40 l.

Technologies that were not anticipatedwhen Kathleen LaBounty was conceivedhave helped children sneak up on donors.An enterprising 15-year-old tracked downhis anonymous sperm-donor dad bymatching his DNA to that of the donor'sfamily on a genealogical website. Theboy paid $289 to familytreedna.com fora genetic test that compared his Y chro­mosome with other Y chromosomes in agenealogical registry. He found severalmales with whom he had a biological link.By using the last names ofthose men, theknown birth date of his biological fatherand county birth records, he was able toidentity his donor ..

An Internet registry thatallows recipients to shareinformation about donorsalso makes it easier to identitythem. Wendy Kramer, whoseson Ryan was conceivedthrough donor insemination,started donorsiblingregistry.com, where donor-conceivedchildren can find their halfsiblings. Moms and kids writeto ask questions like "Whoelse has used donor 2064?"So far, more than 23,100people have registered onthe site, and 6,162 siblingshave been matched.

LaBounty's mother was notgiven a sperm-donor numberor any fucts about the donor,other than that he had beena student at Baylor MedicalSchool. Undeterred, Kathleen recentlywrote to all 600 men who attended theschool at the time of her conception. Amaz­ingly, 250 wrote back, and 40 of them hadbeen donors. Some of the men were aseager as she was to make contact. Onewrote, "I've been waiting 26 years to getyour letter in the mail."

That donor was not alone in his long­ing for information about the child he'dcreated. Kramer was shocked when thedonors themselves started joining onlineconversations. More than 750 spermdonors have registered on her website tocontact their "children." Other donorshave hired private detectives or stolen apeek at private medical records to findout about their biological offspring.

Why would a man who was paid tomasturbate now want a relationshipwith the child? Perhaps the experienceof being a sperm donor is not alwaysthe lark the infertility industry assumed.

Robert Klark Graham offered prizewinning sperm.

As a newly minted lawyer nearly three decadesago, I was determined to practice reproductive­technology law. So when Robert Klark Graham

opened the Repository for Germinal Choice, whichoffered sperm from Nobel laureates, I visited him inEscondido, California. Rather than show me a sleeklaboratory or even a sperm supermarket, Graham tookme to an old well house, where-in a space that lookedlike a suburban rec room-he pointed to a tank of liquidnitrogen. "Imagine the benefitsto society if additional sons ofThomas Edison could be cre­ated," he told me as we staredat the giant metal thermos.

Graham, a millionaire Mensamember who had invented shat­terproof eyeglass lenses, was notalone in his quest to producesmarter children. Back in 1940the Pioneer Fund offered theequivalent of about a year's sal­ary to deserving U.S. Air Corpspilots who already had at leastthree children and who agreedto have another. The money, tobe doled out yearly starting whenthe child reached the age of 12,was to be used for the additionalchild's education.

How did the children of theseefforts turn out? In 1999 Wall

Street journal reporter Douglas A.Blackmon followed up on the children who had been bornunder the Air Corps program and found them to be quiteordinary: air-conditioning repairmen, factory workers. Norhave the Nobel Prize sperm-bank kids broken any records.In fact, the star of Graham's stable of sperm-bank children,Doron Blake, seems just as adrift as any 20-something.

Perhaps that could have been expected. Nobel Prizestend to run in laboratories (or in the University of

Chicago economics department) rather than in fami­lies. William Shockley, a Nobel laureate and donor toGraham's bank, once told PLAYBOY his own childrenwith his less distinguished wife had been "a very sig­nificant regression" to the mean. And even Edison,Graham's hero, considered his own son a failed experi­ment. According to biographer Neil Baldwin, the greatinventor was so ashamed of Thomas Edison Jr. that heoffered him money to change his last name.

In 1999 the Nobel Prize spermbank closed its doors. I wish Icould report that the closure wasbased on a realization that suchawkward attempts at eugenicswere doomed to failure. On thecontrary, mainstream clinics nowoffer catalogs of sperm and eggdonors categorized by IQ andSAT scores. One enterprisingman began to sell his own spermover the Internet by claimingseveral royal families and Catho­lic saints as his ancestors.

But what if a couple pays extrafor smart sperm and E=mc2 isn'tthe first thing out oftheir child'smouth? Already a couple withthree healthy children born withthe help of a donor has sued thesperm bank. Among their alle­gations: If the bank had chosena different donor, their children

would be more attractive.And sometimes you have to be careful what you wish

for. An unmarried man requested a surrogate motherwho was a cross between Eleanor Roosevelt and BrigitteBardot. Amazingly, the surrogacy center found someonewho matched that description. The deal never went for­ward, though. The woman was too headstrong to agreeto the terms of the contract. -L.A.