All amazing points Vern! I'm glad there's someone near the area who can help us sort of visualize this! (I literally knew nothing about Canada until getting invested in this case but have learned so much!).
I agree with you on the sketchiness of his disappearance and find it interesting that the article noted foul play has always been suspected. It was mentioned that he got into an argument with "his company" that night and then never met back up with them?...??? I'm not sure if we are to take the word "company" as friends? Or newer acquaintances? Or old work pals? neighbors? or people he met for the first time that night? It's just so vague.
No matter who these "friends" are, their alibi seems like a cop out to me. I'm guessing the Renfew fair is pretty darn big isnt it? and without cell phones back then did they all really expect to be able to just easily meet back up with eachother amongst all of the crowds? I hope somewhere in the old case files the names of these people are still documented! Granted they are likely not around anymore it would still be interesting to see if any of them had some sort of ties to Alberta.
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But now I must share a BIG UPDATE!!!
I couple weekends ago I was able to get ahold of the nieces and nephews of John Begolo! (Thank you Facebook for existing) and found out a little more about his life. Poor guy was in a bad way after losing his first wife and then later his second wife AND his child. As a result it seems he started to drink away his sorrows and became a full blown alcoholic. At the time of his disappearance he wasn't working as he was in no position to. When he disappeared I think it was truly one of those times where you have no idea where he could have ended up or who he could have run into simply because of his lifestyle. It seemed like he did a lot of things on the fly as the one newspaper article described him as a drifter.
He was loved and missed by his family and they did in fact give interviews and stuff but most of the interviewing was done on tv so that's why there's not much to be found on the internet. I wish we could find the old tv clips but idk if that's possible. His nephew said the interview given by John's brother Jeno was given on a network called CHCH? I'm not sure if they may have archived footage or not though.
The family was a little bummed this came to light just a hair too late as John's 3 siblings have all just passed as of very recent and could have probably answered a lot more. The eldest nephew had last seen his uncle when he was about 14 so I'm surprised he remembered as much as he did!
But my biggest question before I was going to submit any of this as a possible lead was "Did John have a significant gap in his front teeth"? (Much like the teeth of Sam shows) and they were 99% sure that he did. They want to help in any way they can to find uncle John and lay him to rest so I was able to get ahold of the organizations I needed to hook them up with and I think they will hopefully be following up with them soon!
They are all very sweet and I want them to get closure but do worry about how painful this could be mentally if he turns out to be a match. Heck I don't even know the guy and now I feel more invested in finding him than I do identifying Sam at this point. I think they feel as strongly about the possibility of this as I, but we all have that one burning question..."How do you end up all the way in Alberta from Ontario?!?"
But some contributing factors are that authorities have always said they believed the victim was not from the area. That was justified even more so by the 800 dentists in that area that came up with nothing! That's a whole lot of dentists but I bet they didn't reach as far out as Ontario for records!
Something else I looked into was how common hitchhiking was back then and it was HUGE! Mostly with teens but adults would sometimes as well. Especially the drifter types.
Apparently it was also not unusual to try to hitchhike as far as you could go getting ride to ride across the Trans Canada Highway.
Last but not least I did a search on the Clark's Canada website to see where they currently all distribute their shoes to. Most stores could be ruled out as being established well after 1973 but I DID find a shoe store in St. Catherine's that has been in business since 1942 and is right in the immediate area John grew up. Its called The Boot Shop. I could NOT say the same for any shoe stores even moderately close to Tofield. That was just something I wanted to look into though I know the current locations may not reflect all of those in the past either.
I just hope that we are at a point in time where DNA can be matched super easy and fairly fast because out of the last few people suggested in here recently, I feel one of these guys has likely got to be a match!
Something seems off with the story from the friends Begolo was with that night. The article says they were in Douglas and were all going to the Renfrew Fair but made a stop at Eganville to go to a tavern first. At the tavern, they got into a spat and Begolo was last seen drinking there.
As I read that, I was like "why go to Eganville if you'regoing from Douglas to Renfrew? Eganville is the opposite direction and Renfrew has it's own taverns to go to … and a beer tent at the fair.
I live in Arnprior which is southwest of all three of the other locations - all on a direct route to here and a drive I've done numerous times. Furthest northwest is Eganville, drive 15 minutes southwest to Douglas, keep driving 15 minutes further southwest to Renfrew. From Renfrew, it's about 20 minutes to my place. Douglas is still very rural and was more-so back then. I know it's only a 15 minute drive in the opposite direction thn they were apparently heading, but why? There was no need to go there if one wanted a drink.
It makes me curious to know if it were only his 'friends' who he was with who last saw/reported him in Eganville to drink. Are there any independent and 'not involved' witnesses to him actually being seen in Eganville? At the same time, it's a long walk from Eganville back to Douglas down very rural, unlit roads ... would you really just leave a friend there - especially one who had been drinking - to continue on your way BACK through Douglas and on to the fair in Renfrew?
By the same token, if he was drunk and did attempt to walk back to Douglas … there's plenty of heavily wooded areas along the road that he could have wandered into to become hopelessly lost. There's also the Boncherre Caves - a Provincial Park with - obviously - caves, white-water rafting etc and not the average terrain along the way.
It just seems off. Way off.
خرائط Google
. These clothes were far better preserved than I even imagined. If you look close enough you can differentiate the areas of butane and cigarette burns vs the slashes by knife or shears. What was done to the private area is so uncalled for! I don't think this person did anything to deserve going THAT far! That's cruelty to the extreme like why couldn't you have just shot him?! The empath in me has a hard time with it... also those poor folks involved in discovering and retrieving this body must have had nightmares for decades!
