TLC/YouTube "Take at Birth" airs tonight, October 9, 2019, at 10 p.m. ET/9 p.m. CT on TLC. Here's how you can watch the show online without cable.
Taken at Birth, TLC’s six-part, three-night special revisits the case of Dr. Thomas J. Hicks, a who sold and/or gave away more than 200 newborn infants between the 1950s and 1960s. The series airs on TLC from October 9-11 from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET. If you are hoping to catch the show but do not have a cable subscription or TLC added on to your cable package, there are still plenty of ways to watch the special online. Read on for details.
If you don’t have cable or can’t get to a TV, you can watch TLC live on your computer, phone or streaming device by signing up for one of the following cable-free, live-TV streaming services:
TLC is included in Philo’s main 58-channel bundle, which is the cheapest among all streaming services if you plan on keeping it long-term.
You can start a free 7-day trial of Philo TV right here, and you can then watch TLC live on your computer via the Philo website, or on your phone (iPhone supported), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV or or other supported device via the Philo app.
If you can’t watch live, Philo also allows you to DVR programs and watch them up to 30 days later. And even if you forget to DVR something, Philo also comes with a 72-hour rewind feature, which allows you to replay any event that has aired in the last three days.
PlayStation Vue–which doesn’t require an actual PlayStation console to sign up or watch–offers four different live-TV channel packages, all of which include TLC.
You can start a free 5-day trial right here, and you can then watch a live stream of TLC on your computer via the PS Vue website, or on your phone (Android and iPhone supported), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation (3 or 4), or other supported device via the PS Vue app.
If you can’t watch live, PlayStation Vue comes included with cloud DVR.
The Series Explores the Circumstances Surrounding a Black Market Adoption Ring in Georgia as a Man Named Dr. Hicks Sold More Than 200 Newborn Babies Out of His Clinic
The six-hour special shares the untold stories of the “Hicks Babies,” the name given to more than 200 newborn babies illegally sold and/or given away by Dr. Thomas J. Hicks during the 1950s and 1960s. According to TLC, Dr. Hicks, a father of three who was married to a Baptist Sunday school teacher, ran his own clinic in the small, rural Georgia town of McCaysville in Southern Appalachia. There, Dr. Hicks would deliver a child and then sell it on the black market from the back door of his clinic, after telling the birth parents that the baby died.
The docu-series follows investigator Jane Blasio, who found out she was adopted when she was 5-years-old; however, the dark tale of how she was actually acquired by her adoptive parents didn’t emerge until years later. When her adoptive mother passed away, she started digging into the mysterious events surrounding her past, and uncovered how she really came to be be adopted by the family who raised her.
“I went back to McCaysville several times over 14 years gathering stories, but I still had so many questions when it came to finding my birth story. What is going to get me my answers?,” Blasio said in a clip shared by People. “And I had nothing, other than the birth certificate that said ‘Hicks Clinic.’”
A local probate judge became Blasio’s closest ally in her search to uncover the truth. “She didn’t have knowledge of what Dr. Hicks had been doing, and she did not have an allegiance to him or his family,” Blasio says. “And so she went ahead and she perused the birth certificates that he was taking to the county registrar back in the ’50s and ’60s, and found that there were an estimated 200-plus babies that had gone to Akron, Ohio, from the Hicks Clinic.”
The six-part series explores the black market adoption ring that Dr. Hicks was deeply involved in, and helps reunite some of the children who were ripped away from their birth parents with their biological families. Tune in tonight at 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET/PT to catch the first part of Taken at Birth on TLC.
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