Of the thousands of adult adoptees in New Hampshire, only a small fraction have taken advantage of a new state law that allows them to look at their birth records -and makes it easier for them to find their biological families.

In the week since the law went into effect, 81 adult adoptees - or members of their immediate family - have come to the Bureau of Vital Records seeking an original copy of their birth certificate, while 101 have requested the document via mail, said Bill Bolton, director of the New Hampshire Vital Records Office. The demand so far is lighter than anticipated, but still double the number of records requests that the bureau usually handles.

"I was expecting to be buried and then just digging ourselves out over a couple of weeks," Bolton said late Friday afternoon. Instead, the department has been able to maintain a 15-minute turnaround time for walk-in requests.

Although New Hampshire no longer places any restrictions on access to birth certificates, it does ask birth parents to fill out a form on which they can indicate whether they'd like to be contacted by their child, through an intermediary, or not at all. The form is attached to the birth certificate if the adoptee claims it. Birth parents who request no contact are asked to complete a family medical history for their child. So far, only 19 birth parents have filled out the form, Bolton said. Four or five said they'd welcome contact, while the rest have requested no contact. Of those saying they'd prefer not to be contacted, nine have filled out a medical history form.

Bolton said he thought that birth parents not wanting contact might be more likely to fill out the form right away.

Adoption laws affect large numbers of people: About 127,000 children were adopted in 2001 in the United States - a figure that's consistent with the number of adoptions that have occurred each year since 1987, according to the federal government's National Adoption Information Clearinghouse. In New Hampshire, 1,320 adoptions took place in 2000 and 2001, while 800 adoptions occurred in Vermont during that period.

The trend toward open adoption records is making it easier for adoptees to look for their birth families. Half of all adoptees in the United States and abroad choose to search for birth relatives at some point in their lives - more than ever before, according to the clearinghouse.

Contrary to popular belief, adoption records were open during the first part of the 20th century, said Elizabeth Samuels, a professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law. By 1960, however, 26 states had closed their records, and nearly every state had followed by the late '80s. (New Hampshire closed its records in 1973.)