Our Missing Children Programs

National Child Safety Council is perhaps best known for its efforts to address the nationwide tragedy of missing and abducted children. NCSC initiated the first nationally coordinated Missing Children Milk Carton Program, which was implemented by over 700 independent dairies across the nation. Photographs and biographies were placed on millions of milk carton side panels, bringing the faces of abducted children and the reality of this national disaster directly to countless Americans and individuals worldwide. Preventive safety messages to help educate youngsters and combat child abduction were made availble for printing on half-pint milk cartons which were delivered by the billions to school lunchrooms every day. Hundreds of national, regional, and local businesses, too numerous to mention individually, joined the program by donating space on packaging or printing informational flyers, posters, and other handouts to help our missing children efforts.

The combined efforts of NCSC, CompuServe, and Quick Pictures Forum made it possible for law enforcement departments throughout the world to easily access a database, the first of its kind, containing the portraits and descriptions of abducted children.

In 1984, NCSC introduced the new International Abducted Children Directory^® containing the first comprehensive free-of-charge listing of abducted children. It was delivered to all police and sheriff departments, state police headquarters, and FBI offices; all governors and attorneys general nationwide; and to the U.S. Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

In 1985, The Missing Children Directory^® was distributed to principals of public and private schools in the U.S. THis cooperative venture between NCSC and QSP, a subsidiary of the Reader's Digest Association, Inc., involved virtually every school district in the U.S. In support of the effort, NCSC operated a 24-hour-a-day 800 hotline, through which dedicated and fully trained professional specialists received missing children sighting reports.

NCSC also developed the patented LIFE TAG^® emergency medical information microfilm viewer, which is a small pendant that hangs on a necklace or keychain worn or carried by children, the elderly, and the handicapped. LIFE TAG^® supplied instant medical and identification information to rescue personnel in the event of an accident, injury, sudden illness, or other emergency.