Her family raised the reward to $25,000, up from $15,000. This comes after recent search efforts earlier in September. Maine Game Wardens searched near the Oberton Stream and west of Mount Abram Trail, which didn't have documented ground search efforts. There were also several search efforts over the summer, despite no new information or leads.
The reward will be for anyone who can provide information leads to locating Largay.
Near the top of Poplar Ridge, they stopped and took in the topography. Thick vegetation walled the trail on either side. Beyond it, precipitous cliffs dropped more than a hundred feet into caves and boulder gardens deep enough to swallow a truck. “My gosh,” Clark said to her friend, “if you were six inches off the trail here, you’d be gone. And no one would ever find you”...
Other hikers would spend that Sunday night at the Poplar Ridge shelter — a northbound female hiker who kept to herself, two young men heading south — but the three women hit it off. They spent their evening together, cooking their dinners over compact backpacking stoves. Rust and Clark were instantly enamored. Here was a woman who had been an Air Force nurse, who had banded seabirds on a Pacific atoll, and taken her family on trips to Costa Rica and Spain. “She was just full of confidence and joy — a real delight to talk to,” recalls Rust...
The rain began before dawn on Tuesday, July 23, and didn’t let up until afternoon. Gerry was due at the trailhead near Route 27 by that evening... When nightfall arrived and Gerry still hadn’t, George decided to sleep in his SUV. He figured Inchworm had been held up by the rain, but he wanted to be there, just in case she popped out of the woods.
The Stratton Motel serves as a hostel and clearinghouse for thru-hikers. Its owner, Sue Critchlow, regularly pitches in as their shuttle and answering service. She recalls an unidentified person calling on Wednesday and claiming to have spent Tuesday night with Inchworm at the Spaulding Lean-to, the shelter Gerry had been planning to use on Monday night. Her husband is waiting for her at Route 27, said the caller. Tell him she’s going to be late. Critchlow says the voice sounded like a woman’s, but that’s all she remembers.
In addition, no one has come forward and admitted making the mystery call to Critchlow, despite widely publicized pleas. Wardens eventually began to discount it, saying it was a simple case of someone getting their information confused. They no longer believed Gerry spent either Monday or Tuesday night at the Spaulding Lean-to. Instead, wardens began focusing on the difficult terrain back near Poplar Ridge.
ME - Gerry Largay, 66, Appalachian Trail / Sandy River Plantation
$25,000 Reward -- NamUs: MP # 22046
*The Town of Rangeley, Franklin County, is in Western, Maine.
Day 542
https://www.findthemissing.org/en/cases/case_report_html/22046
*Area Last Seen: http://www.bing.com/maps/#Y3A9NDAuM...leSUyQyUyME1haW5lJTJDJTIwVW5pdGVkJTIwU3RhdGVz
Zoom -- Bird's Eye View -- Rotate All 4 Directions
Our Support to Gerry's On-Line, and In-Person Searchers.
There is something to be said imo that this is the first case in Maine of a missing hiker to go unsolved.
I'm still envious of her doing this alone. It has to be gorgeous anytime of day in those mountains. After seeing the North Woods episode, some of those drop offs high up looked deadly. I still think if she slipped there she would've been found by now though. Those searchers really canvassed the areas she would've been in. Imo
Very little info on Jesse O Hoover..While searching around I happened to see this old Maine MP case from the early 1980s, Jesse O. Hoover, I don't think she's been mentioned on the thread:
http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/h/hoover_jesse.html
http://www.maine.gov/tools/whatsnew/index.php?topic=state_police_unsolved&id=11307&v=Article-missing
Coincidental similarities to Gerry are age and gender, though Jesse was not an experienced hiker, had health problems and was taller and heavier (their names are very close too, but I don't think we're dealing with someone who deliberately targets similarly-named women 30 years apart). Jesse may not have gotten on the trail at all I suppose, could have been abducted near the park headquarters, or her body may have been found but left unidentified. I could search through unidentifieds found in AT states after May 1983 maybe.
I doubt very much that body was Ms.Hoover as that is quite a hike from Baxter State Park ,where she was last sighted. Somebody would have noticed a 5'10" woman at some point on the trail and keep in mind she was ill equipped for the hike to start with. Nice sleuthing anyway.. I still find it almost inconceivable that a person could disappear on that trail unintentionally and not be located.Re Jesse Hoover, I searched through unidentified remains found after May 1983 and found a case from 1984 that maybe fits in terms of hair style, age and context of location: https://identifyus.org/en/cases/9736 (Findthemissing's JH page: https://www.findthemissing.org/en/cases/6955/0 )
IdentifyUs says the UP's remains were found by a hiker in a wooded area near Central Valley and Route 6, New York. Central Valley seems to be very close to the AT, just a few miles north-west of Bear Mountain Bridge over the Hudson where the AT goes across. Central Valley is a tiny town and doesn't appear on many AT maps that I looked at, but I found this one that shows the AT in red and Central Valley and Route 6, lower-middle of the map:
http://www.cnyhiking.com/ATinNY-Map01.jpg
I emailed this idea to Lori Bruski at NamUs on the off-chance it might be useful. Not all the details fit plus there is no DNA for JH, so I think there's only a 10% chance of it being a match.
I doubt very much that body was Ms.Hoover as that is quite a hike from Baxter State Park ,where she was last sighted. Somebody would have noticed a 5'10" woman at some point on the trail and keep in mind she was ill equipped for the hike to start with. Nice sleuthing anyway.. I still find it almost inconceivable that a person could disappear on that trail unintentionally and not be located.