WV - Sodder Family - 5 children, Christmas eve 1945 - #3

[Teresa Larson]

Thanks fox1950! I wonder if Mr. Sodder's delivery of goods via his trucking business had any connection with/to (directly or indirectly) Mr. Cipriani's business. I'm still snagging on the "settling Mr. Cipriani's estate" (paraphrasing).

Mr Sodder hauled coal for the coal mines.

 

[TallCoolOne]

Mr Sodder hauled coal for the coal mines.

Have you read Granddaughters response just a few posts above yours?

 

[birdie74]

I just wanted to say hi. I know I haven't been posting much lately, but don't think I've abandoned the board. I'm still checking it daily, but just haven't had anything new to add. Everyone's been doing a great job of jumping in and answering questions before I read them, so that's great to see. I'm glad to see new people joining this case, too.

I hope to go back to Cortez in a couple of months and speak to some people there. If I get any new info before that I'll definitely post it.

 

[Teresa Larson]

Shoot ... just typed a big, long message and lost it. I think I timed out taking a phone call. Here's the short version. Sorry I've been absent for so long. As Birdie said, I 've been swamped with my business and family stuff. We recently added two very young foster children to our home, so I haven't had any spare time for weeks.

On the trucking business, my grandfather wasn't hauling coal at the time. He was primarily moving goods from train and boat to stores and private individuals. These were the days before semi trucks rolling across the US, when long hauls were done by boat and river and then moved by trucks. His coal mines began around 1948 and ended some time in the 1960's after a fatality in the mine due to methane. Mining was very risky back then, and my grandfather couldn't stand to lose another life. His trucking business continued after his death through my uncles. They did haul coal for others after closing the mines.

There were no mines near my grandparent's home. My grandfather's mines (after the fire) were on Gauley Mountain near Hawks Nest, and later at Boomer.

Hope this helps. I'll try not to be absent for so long.

This is new information Granddaughter. It states every where in this thread and in the news articles that Mr Sodder hauled coal for the coal mines when the fire happened. I am surprised this wasn't mentioned a long time ago.

 

[Laura_Bean]

Okay so I have some ideas and wanted to run them by everybody.

1 = The children are outside doing chores when their mother accidentally locks them out of the house. Instead of waking their parents, the children decide to go and play in the woods and they probably had a small lantern with them. In the dark they could easily have become lost. One wrong turn, than another, and than another as they hurriedly try to find the house. By the time the sun comes up, they are freezing and too far away from the home to be heard screaming. It would be easy for these small children to succumb to the cold. And no one went looking for them at first, because well, everyone believed the children were dead in the fire. They could have walked for miles before even realizing how lost they were. And it's quite possible, (it being winter, slippery, etc) that they died of hypothermia, or could have tried to take a shortcut to get home, such as across a frozen lake? Which wasn't thick enough to hold them. The fire could have been accidental. The Sodder's try to get to their children, the cold is the reason the cars will not start, and the ladder and other property being stolen could have been a coincidence. This is my first thought/idea.

 

[Laura_Bean]

2 = My second idea is that the children themselves took the ladder and cut the phone lines. Could the children have been trying to get into the phone lines and prank call other homes? Could they have done this in the past, and be doing it again? Maybe they called their mother by mistake, perhaps they were trying to call the person they asked for, and didn't realize they had the wrong line until their mother said "He doesn't live here". Perhaps the children played with the phone line and accidentally cut it in the process. Perhaps also, the children than played with fire. No I am not saying the children were bad or horrible or anything, but we have all done stupid things as young teenagers and children. And perhaps between the phone line being cut, and the house being caught ablaze they were much too afraid to return home. I would be scared if it was me.

 

[Teresa Larson]

The door was not locked when Mrs. Sodder got up. If they were outside she would have heard them knocking on the door when they tried to get back into the house and even if they did play with the phone wires they couldn't have talked to anybody If they did set the fire and were afraid to come back where would they have gone all these years? It was too cold for them to run away that night. IMO

 

[birdie74]

I can see why the children wouldn't want to wake up their parents if they were locked out, but if it were very cold out, I think they would have anyway. Maybe they wouldn't have if they had parents who were overly strict, but that wasn't the case. Mrs. Sodder was apparently a light sleeper, especially that night with all the interruptions.

I don't know much about phone lines, so I'm not sure how that could work for them to prank call from curring the lines. There's always the chance that they wandered off for some reason, but to me it wouldn't explain all of the other strange events in this case.

 

[fox1950]

It was a cold, rainy night. Ice was hanging from the house and probably trees, phone and telephone lines, also. Mrs. Sodder awoke when the phone rang and thought it strange the children had not locked the door and closed the curtains. If the children had died during the night due to exposure, Fayetteville is a avid hunting area. Some hunter would have found their bones even in a remote area.

Fayetteville is a some town, there was much going on that night with people passing by and stopping and watching the fire. Where the Sodder's lived is country, even through it was just a few miles from Fayetteville. I can't see them running away-someone who would have picked them up would surely have told the family.

Great Laura. Your posts always give us food for thought. Keep posting.

 

[Laura_Bean]

Thing is birdie, if they were excited about christmas in the morning, etc, perhaps they went looking for santa or were just so excited the cold didn't phase them at first. I remember as a child I once went outside playing with some friends, and even though it was extremely cold and I wasn't wearing anything but a coat I played for a good twenty minutes. My grandma was angry, because she said I would catch my death of cold, and did get sick soon after. But during the playtime, I barely felt the cold. I was having too much fun playing. If the siblings were friends, and enjoyed playing together, they may not have felt the cold until it was too late. Now, I do agree with Fox, however. If the area had tons of hunters going through constantly, someone should have found them. At least you would think they would have.

 

[Teresa Larson]

Thing is birdie, if they were excited about christmas in the morning, etc, perhaps they went looking for santa or were just so excited the cold didn't phase them at first. I remember as a child I once went outside playing with some friends, and even though it was extremely cold and I wasn't wearing anything but a coat I played for a good twenty minutes. My grandma was angry, because she said I would catch my death of cold, and did get sick soon after. But during the playtime, I barely felt the cold. I was having too much fun playing. If the siblings were friends, and enjoyed playing together, they may not have felt the cold until it was too late. Now, I do agree with Fox, however. If the area had tons of hunters going through constantly, someone should have found them. At least you would think they would have.

Not all of the kids were young. There was 2 older ones They were too old to believe in Santa and they would have had enough sense to come inside.

 

[birdie74]

I suppose anything is possible. It's good that after reading all about the case, we can come at it from different view points and put more options out there. My gut leads me to think it was foul play, but many think they died in the fire or have other theories. It's good to put all of these ideas on the table.

 

[Laura_Bean]

Did the children have any money? Allowance type stuff? The older children do odd jobs to make money? Just a small idea that I have forming. I know back than children could easily get small odd jobs, maybe not Betty, but the others, the older children?

 

[Laura_Bean]

Did the children have any money? Allowance type stuff? The older children do odd jobs to make money? Just a small idea that I have forming. I know back than children could easily get small odd jobs, maybe not Betty, but the others, the older children?

 

[birdie74]

I just wanted to bump up this thread. The general discussion has shifted to another thread but it's probably easier to follow for future readers if we discuss it here.

 

[snowme]

I can see why the children wouldn't want to wake up their parents if they were locked out, but if it were very cold out, I think they would have anyway. Maybe they wouldn't have if they had parents who were overly strict, but that wasn't the case. Mrs. Sodder was apparently a light sleeper, especially that night with all the interruptions.

I don't know much about phone lines, so I'm not sure how that could work for them to prank call from curring the lines. There's always the chance that they wandered off for some reason, but to me it wouldn't explain all of the other strange events in this case.

bold by me
That's the nagging thing that keeps me believing they didn't die in the fire. All those other odd little things... and not so little odd things. For instance... who takes a Christmas Eve midnight fire as the opportunity to steal from them?!!! Who does that?! If he would do that (or allow that to be thought of him to do), I'd suspect he'd do anything. And I do suspect that man. I don't recall reading anything that made me believe that LE or anyone else looked at him in any light but a thief and it seems he was dealt with in a very light fashion, considering. I find that convenient.

 

[Laura_Bean]

Hold on one second... I just thought of something, was going to post something entirely different but after reading the last posts over and over, something just occurred to me.

"It was a rainy cold night". Just rain or thunder and lightning?

Did anyone inspect where the line had been "cut"? Could a direct hit with lightning to the phone line cut it and created a spark that went right up the phone line and to the roof of the house? If the line was hit by lightning, and than it created a spark which followed the line to the house, and set the roof on fire, that could explain easily how it got started. Sort of like setting fire to the end of a firecracker.

 

[Laura_Bean]

Why was the ladder near the phone line? Perhaps the man stealing the ladder, dropped it there, and ended up leaving it if it was too heavy, and the stealing could have happened before the fire even was started. I don't think I would call him a cold blooded killer just yet.

Now I have another point to make real quick. There were reports of MarthaLee living in a convent in New Orleans. We have a picture that looks like the younger of the two boys, Louis Sodder coming in from possibly somewhere in Italy. We have a photograph of a little girl living in New York and taking a ballet class, supposedly it was Betty. This would be why I am beginning to believe it entirely possible that these children were taken by family, (I don't know a motive yet), and split up. Without the family's knowledge is entirely possible.

 

[snowme]

Why was the ladder near the phone line? Perhaps the man stealing the ladder, dropped it there, and ended up leaving it if it was too heavy, and the stealing could have happened before the fire even was started. I don't think I would call him a cold blooded killer just yet.

Now I have another point to make real quick. There were reports of MarthaLee living in a convent in New Orleans. We have a picture that looks like the younger of the two boys, Louis Sodder coming in from possibly somewhere in Italy. We have a photograph of a little girl living in New York and taking a ballet class, supposedly it was Betty. This would be why I am beginning to believe it entirely possible that these children were taken by family, (I don't know a motive yet), and split up. Without the family's knowledge is entirely possible.

I'm not calling him a cold blooded killer - because I've seen nothing that confirms those children died that night. I just find it too coincidental that he happened to be caught stealing during a tragic fire on a cold, windy Christmas Eve that turned out to be even more of a mystery due to the odd phone call (laughing lady), lack of forensic evidence of five of the family members who were no longer with them afterward, and the fact that the community members who would normally be called upon to tend to a fire were so uncaring to the point of not even trying to get there till morning. Alot of things just seem too *convenient*.

 

[raf]

Thank you Fox and Catsy for looking all of that up! BTW, I think it's kind of funny that we're a fox, cat, and bird. I hope nobody's hungry because I would be at the bottom of that food chain!

The people finder idea helped a lot and some other googling led me to a list of Frank Sr. and Louise's heirs, so that gives me a good idea of who the kids were.

I mainly want to know who they are so that if I find anything that indicates other kids lived with them, I can narrow it down. I also figure if I can find his biological kids in yearbooks or something, I might be able to find the Sodders among other kids there, most likely with different names.

It looks like Edward and Frank Jr. still live there. I know someone needs to question them about they know know of their cousins, but I don't want to do it myself just yet. I know they're probably nice guys, and even if their family was involved, they likely were told the same story as the Sodder kids, but I don't want to take any chances just yet. Maybe by some miracle I'll come across some evidence that proves they were there, and if I do I'll take it to law enforcement and let them ask the questions. After all, a lot of people have been afraid to talk for many years, and we still don't know if the family has mafia connections. I'd rather talk to people who knew the family (like schoolmates) before I talk to the family themselves. If I find nothing useful, I'll probably go back on a later trip and talk directly to family members if I can. Maybe I'm paranoid, but I am a young lady who will be traveling there alone.

Hi dear birdie74,
maybe this is not helpful, however Edward Cipriani, I believe was born with complete name of Edward Joseph Cipriani in the 19 Nov 1921; he died in 26 May 1998 Manatee, FLORIDA; he had a son:
Edward Joseph Cipriani Jr married at Pamela Joan Walton in the 20 Jan 1973 Manatee FL; divorced: 28 Mar 1979..
maybe this is Frank's son...
best regards,
raf