When the owner of a small business moves, it does not necessarily mean that his place of self employment closed down or moved. Possibly your classmate made a success of the shop or store and the family moved to fancier digs since the last reunion. You could then find your classmate at the business, where telephone numbers take on a kind of permanency. If the business was sold, the new owner might help or forward a letter for you.
If you know the former address, you would know the county, or other political entitiy in which the classmate had a business. The local government usually maintains a list of the fictitious business name certificates filed, or business licenses issued. Anyone seeking to open a bank account in a name other than their own, must make a public declaration. Some of these agencies have placed their index on the Internet.
For example, if you are on the 1979 La Habra High School reunion committee and you wanted to locate Roger Hovey, the varsity football quarterback, you could do this if you knew only that his last known address was in San Diego. By visiting the San Diego County fictitious name index, you would find a Roger M. Hovey using three business names, one of which is The Sports Fan. A search of yellow pages type Web sites, such as Netscape Yellow Pages, will provide you with the telephone number for the business in San Diego, now listed simply as the Sports Fan.
Several California County Recorders now participate in a Web site, the CRiis
Group which offers on-line access to applications for business licenses and
ficitious business names, as well as other documents. As of July 16
2000, not all records had been uploaded.
 San Diego County Fictitious Business Name Listing Input format: last first |
The CRiis Group |
 San Mateo County, California Fictitious Business Names Input format: last |
 Clark
County, Nevada, Business License/Owners Input format: last, first |
BigBook Business Directory |
 Netscape Yellow Pages |
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