Hello, I'm not sure if this is the appropriate place for introductions, but I couldn't find an introductions thread, so here it is.
I've been reading over the threads relating to Sheila and Kate Lyon with much interest. I found this website after learning yesterday that a fictional novel, What the Dead Know, inspired by their disappearance has been published (and recommended on Salon.com as one of their recommended summer reading).
Like others here (how amazing, I wonder if I knew any of you then), I lived in Kensington in 1975 when the Lyon sisters went missing. In fact, I lived less then a quarter of a mile from them, on Glenway Drive, and went to Oakland Terrace Elementary School with Kate. She was a year older than me, so I didn't know her well, but I remember her. I have several vivid memories of her in the halls and at recess on the fields and playground. She was a very pretty girl with white-blonde hair. Very wholesome girl next door. I don't ever recall seeing or meeting her older sister.
Despite our close proximity, we did not run in the same neighborhood "pack" after school. I think this may be because a tributary of Rock Creek ran between our two parts of the neighborhood and our gang generally stayed on our side and their's on their side.
It has been very interesting to read other kid's reminicensces about the neighborhood at that time. And also interesting to consider possible adbuction strategies based on the character and layout of the neighborhood.
As a kid, I and all of my friends ran all over that area. It's not like today. My oldest son will be nine in September, and I would never dream of letting him run out of the house with a shout to be back by dinner time. Yet, that's what our parents did back then.
Some, perhaps trivial and even irrelevant, observations:
The neighborhood was very quiet. I've read many others here speculate that this would have made a car or van abduction along Drumm Avenue very difficult because neighbors would have noticed. I've thought a lot about this. First, although the neighborhood was quiet, we did not generally know people outside our immediate area. I, and my parents, had friends along Glenway Drive and Farragut Avenue and a few friends on the part of McComas that ran near our street. But, for instance, I only knew one boy who lived on the part of Drumm Avenue that intersected with McComas. I had only one friend on Jennings Drive. I vividly remember her because she was one of the only kids in my grade that had a swimming pool in her back yard and it was a big deal to get invited to her house. So, if I had been walking down Drumm Avenue in 1975, I don't think any of the people on that street, with the possible exception of the boy I mentioned, would have known me at all.
So, despite the fact that it was a quiet neighborhood, folks generally kept to themselves and their immediate neighbors.
And, it really was a quiet neighborhood in the sense that there weren't a lot of people outside most of the time. Mostly just kids playing. It's not like today when it is common to see people out jogging or walking with strollers. I never saw such things when I was a kid and roaming the neighborhood. Frankly, I think it would have been very easy to either lure or strong arm the girls into a car on Drumm Avenue and no one else be the wiser. It would just be a matter of timing and the opportunity would be there most of the time.
So, if you're ruling out the little boy's sighting of the girls on Drumm Avenue because of the quiet, close-knit character of the neighborhood, I'd rethink that.
Now, the point about how difficult it would be to follow the girls from Wheaton Plaza through the neighborhood is a much stronger one. It's been a long time since I was in the neighborhood (moved away in 78 and have been back only a few times) but I recall that the streets were quite winding and that the most common walking route to the Plaza involved cutting through several vacant lots or unpaved areas. In other words, if one was heading to Wheaton Plaza or Glenmont Pool, which was next to Wheaton Plaza, one would not walk only on streets. So, a car trying to follow the two girls out of the mall and on their way home, would have had trouble. To do it, I think the person would have had to be very familiar with the layout of the neighborhood and the path used by folks walking to the mall. In other words, someone who knew how the foot traffic went, could watch the girls leave the mall, zip around from University Blvd and into the neighborhood and then wait for them at a point along Drumm. This scenario needs the perpetrator to be very familiar with the neighborhood and how walkers get to the mall from it and also with the general direction the Lyon sisters would be moving in (in other words, where they lived in the neighborhood). This is because, if they had lived elsewhere in the neighborhood (say Jennings near Maybrook Avenue, for instance), they would not have headed down Drumm at all to get home.
This suggests that, if the girls were abducted while walking home, the perpetrator lived in the area and knew (or knew of) the girls at least somewhat, enough to know they lived over on Pliers Mill past the school. Other facts suggest the abductor knew the girls. The fact that he was able to get both of them in the car and without anyone noticing also suggests he was familiar to them.
The idea that the abductor was not a stranger to the neighborhood doesn't jive well with the Tape Recorder Man, though, as that man appears to have been a stranger to the Lyon family and didn't get recognized by neighborhood residents once the sketches were released. So, despite the oddity of his presence at Wheaton Plaza on that day, I wouldn't jump to a firm conclusion that he was involved. I agree that he might have been, but I wouldn't get wedded to the idea.
Also, there are (or were) several wooded areas between Wheaton Plaza and the Lyon home where an abduction could have taken place. I'm really glad this never occurred to me while I was a kid because I ran all around in those woods and the thought that the crime occurred there would have totally creeped me out and probably caused me to stay in my yard. But, I wonder now if they weren't grabbed in one of those areas.
First, where Drumm Avenue intersects with McComas, there used to be a nursing home (perhaps it's still there?) that had a lot of land around it and a pond. Then adjacent to that and backing up to Jennings was a large wooded area. Relying on my memory as a ten-year old, I'd say it was at least 5 or 6 acres. It was very overgrown, full of woods and fallen trees and a dry creek bed, I think. I walked on a path through these woods to Jennings every day on my way to and from school. If the girls cut through this path to Jennings as well, this would have been a great opportunity to grab them, and even kill them, without anyone seeing a thing. Now, obviously their bodies weren't ever found there. And, from mapquest it appears a subdivision now sits were the woods were, so I'm assuming if their bodies were there, they would have been found when the land was clear cut and graded. That means, if they were grabbed (and killed) in those woods, the perpetrator had to remove their bodies without being seen. That would have been a very tricky feat.
There is also a large wooded area around the creek between Glenway Drive and Pliers Mill. With the exception of a plant nursery on the part of Drumm Avenue that comes off of Pliers Mill, this area was undisturbed and fairly isolated. Kids played in here all the time. There was even a rope swing down by the creek that we all loved to go and swing on. It was a popular hang out for years. I'm sure, during my five years living there, I climbed and crawled all over every square inch of that area. I also don't think the Lyon sisters would have had need to go down in there to get home. I think their most direct route home would have had them walking Drumm to McComas then around the nursing home and through the vacant lot at the end of Glenway Drive and up the hill to where Drumm Avenue started up again and dumped them out on to Pliers Mill. Or dwon Drumm to McComas, around the nursing home and through the path in the woods to Jennings and then to Pliers Mill. Those are the only two ways I would have walked from Wheaton Plaza to Pliers Mill at that time, anyway.
That portion of Drumm coming off Pliers Mill was quite isolated in 1975. My friend Becky lived at the dead end of Drumm and a boy my age named Rusty lived at the nursery. That road had a very rural feel to it, despite the suburban surroundings. It wasn't residential at all. So, that might be another good point to grab the girls and get them in a car without anyone seeing.
I know I'm just rambling here. Reading everyone's posts has just brought a lot of it back to me. I remember when the girls went missing. How scared and upset everyone was. For we children, it was quite eery. Funny, though. It really wasn't the end of my innocence. After a few months, we were all back running around the neighborhood like a pack of wild dogs. We played capture the flag, explored old Mr. Boyd's mansion and grounds (now Kensington Heights Park) and walked to Glenmont pool or McDonald's on summer days. I can even remember leading expeditions with flashlights up the storm drains to Glenmont pool in six grade! (It seemed very cool at the time, but now I wonder what I was thinking! Yuck!)
I want to say that I admire the rigorous and intelligent way some of you here, especially Richard and Thrasher, keep turning over and examining every possible clue and connection. There's always a chance something, even something small and seemingly inconsequential, you uncover will help solve the mystery of the Lyon sisters' disappearance.
As I've read through all the analysis and comments here, I've found myself becoming increasingly frustrated. It's very hard to know that I was there at the time and can offer nothing really to help with this case. I am also amazed at how little about the case I actually knew at the time. I think my parents must have shielded me from the details. I knew the girls were walking home from Wheaton Plaza and had been seen by a boy along the way, but I don't recall ever hearing about the Tape Recorder Man at the time. This fact is quite shocking to me now for several reasons. First, what if I or my friends had seen or encountered TRM somewhere? As far as I can recall, no one ever asked any of us. And I don't remember discussing it with my friends. Second, what if he had continued "interviewing" children. I would have had no warning to stay away from him and report him to my mother. I also never heard about the 15-year old girl abducted and left for dead in July 1975. I only learned about her while reading this board.
Well, enough for now. I want to do some more reading and see if anything else occurs to me.
And, if any of the Lyon family ever reads these board, my heart is with you all. I have thought of you and your missing girls many, many times over the years. I know this sounds odd, but I feel a strong connection to you and to Kate and hope someday we can learn what happened to her and her sister.
