In today's complicated world of instant communication by electronic devices that seem to run our lives, let us not overlook the benefits, even as we worry about the lack of privacy.
There was a time when such a means of communication might have solved mysteries and prevented decades of heartache.
A child went missing in 1871. It was feared that he was stolen by Gypsies.
It was also thought he might have been kidnapped by "Italians" and forced into a life of "mendicancy." This word, now out of regular use, denoted the practice of begging as a profession.
It was reported that children were stolen and put to work begging on city streets.
Children, especially those with sweet singing voices, were put on corners or near restaurants to sing for passers-by while their handler collected money.
The practice of faking injury or extreme neediness to facilitate begging was so widespread that the New York City police force created a Mendicancy Squad that worked with local charities.
The figures collected by the police found that of any hundred beggars, 96 were "undeserving" of help.
The New York City police came to know a man doing business as banker for the mendicants, who had offices in an exclusive building whose offices rented for $8,000 per year.
Upon arrest, the affluent "beggar" sent a telegram to this man and was promptly supplied legal counsel and bail money.
The problem was not confined to large cities. In 1894, in the midst of an economic crisis, the Quincy police had to be diligent in keeping vagrants away from the business area downtown.
The newspaper reported a complaint from a resident of Jersey Street that a gang of beggars had set up camp nearby and forced him and his neighbors to lock their doors as a precautionary measure. "These are professional tramps and would rather starve than work."
Gypsies were itinerant bands of tinkers, traders and sometimes petty thieves who traveled through Quincy, with regularity.
They were frequently accused when a child went missing.
There were three waves of immigration by Gypsies coming to America. The first in the 1850s were the Romnichels, English Gypsies known for horse-trading and fortune-telling.
The next wave was the Rom, from Serbia, Russia and Austria-Hungary, who were coppersmiths and fortune-tellers.
The third were the Ludar, or Romanian Gypsies from Bosnia, who were known as animal trainers and often performed in circuses and show business.
All of these immigrations halted in 1914 when American laws were tightened.
The missing child in 1871 was a young son of a talented singer and teacher who was in charge of the music department at the Quincy Female Seminary.
Professor William Leib had just organized the Arion Musical Society, and performed at the annual school exercises in May.
In June he performed an organ concert in the Presbyterian church, where people came "to see and hear the largest and most expensive instrument in our city."
On June 21, he went to Chicago for an audition. On June 26 his young son Freddie failed to return home at dinner time from playing among the wagons at the Miller Carriage yard near his home at Sixth and Maine.
The police were notified by bedtime when he could not be found.
The child had a charming singing voice and was a "chubby faced little chap of five" who was barefoot and wearing summer clothes when he vanished.
All of the usual search tactics were employed: The river was dragged, wells were probed, school children were canvassed for information, and rewards were offered.
The inevitable rumors arose and were investigated, although by the time police received information and responded, the child, wagon or suspect had disappeared.
In the weeks and months that followed, the distraught Prof. Leib traveled to St. Louis; Aurora; Galesburg; Des Moines, Iowa; and Kansas City (twice).
He made a tour of major Eastern cities, taking photographs of his son made in Mrs. Reed's photographic studio in Quincy.
He tracked down rumors and reports that Gypsies had the child in Ohio or Kansas or Wyoming and others that the Italians had him in New York. He looked at numerous small boys, but none was Freddie.
Leib even employed the Pinkerton agency, whose detectives said the child had been taken to Canada.
Yet, all the while, the grieving father kept up his musical career to support his wife and other children.
His Arion Society performed a benefit concert for the destitute in Chicago after the great fire there; and he opened his own school of music at Sixth and Hampshire and taught at the Johnson College in Quincy.
In all, he searched for his son for 51 years. Leib left Quincy in 1875, and had a successful career first in Minnesota and then in Kansas City. His wife, who never recovered from her grief, died in 1885. Lieb eventually retired to a farm near Joplin, Mo., where he died in 1924. Almost exactly one year after his death, a man came forth claiming to be Freddie, with an involved and fantastic story. He said he had been taken by a woman slighted in love by Leib, who took him East and gave him to a foster mother who raised him as Robert T. Clark. He claimed he only learned he was "stolen" in 1924.
In 1924 the Kansas-City Times received this statement from Freddie's sister: "Some of the many and loving friends of our family seem still to be in doubt as to whether we are certain of the identity of the so-called Robert T. Clark as that of my brother, Frederick S. Leib, and I wish to say that his identity has been fully verified as that of our brother."
But in 1925 a court in Joplin ruled against Clark, refusing to name him as the missing Freddie. The case remains unsolved. Long before Amber Alerts and cellphone calls, it took hours or days before a report of suspicious behavior reached authorities and suspects could be stopped and questioned.
Beth Lane is the author of "Lies Told Under Oath," the story of the 1912 Pfanschmidt murders near Payson. She is executive director of the Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County.