A man who was abandoned by his birth mother in a London phone box in the 1970s has reconnected with the family he never knew he had.
Chris Mason met his father Dominic and four siblings after being reunited through ITV’s Long Lost Family.
The show aims to reunite family members who have never met, including twins separated at birth and young mothers who have had to give up their babies.
Mr Mason was discovered in a London phone box as a newborn just before Christmas 1966. He was later adopted by parents who brought him up with their two children in Wimbledon.
Despite numerous attempts to reconnect with his biological family, Mr Mason was not able to locate them until he made an application to the ITV show.
A DNA test conducted for the show found that his late mother, Elizabeth, was an Irish woman who married a US airman and moved to the US state of Maine. Researchers were able to connect him with Elizabeth’s daughter Marie, his half-sister.
Speaking to Lorraine, Mr Mason said that his father Dominic had been “welcoming, friendly and loving” since their reunion.
“If the tables were turned, I just hope we would have been the same. It's a big thing for them, someone knocking on your front door after 55 years,” Mr Mason said of his siblings.
“There has been a lot of meetings and greetings, it's been a really great example.”
Speaking about his mother, Mr Mason said: “It’s closed a circle. It was never a real concern, but if I’d have the chance, I’d have loved to have told my birth mother that if she had any problems or worries or guilt over what she had to do, it must have been a horrendous position that she was put in.”
Mr Mason said that he did not hold a grudge against his mother for making the decision.
“Back in the 1960s it was a different time. She must have been scared. The only way is to go forward, you can't judge what people go through.”
