WI WI - Evelyn Hartley, 15, La Crosse, 24 Oct 1953

[punklove]

The whole jacket thing bothers me - I wonder if the owner of the jacket was a reclusive type person and thats why people didnt notice or report having seen that jacket ever? Its apparent someone cared for the jacket enough to mend it (or have it mended) numerous times and to keep it very clean, so it just seems strange that nobody came forward to ID the jacket when this case was such a big deal? I can understand nobody knowing the shoes, but this jacket was very much unique and would be noticeable so why did nobody report it?

 

[Robin Hood]

The whole jacket thing bothers me - I wonder if the owner of the jacket was a reclusive type person and thats why people didnt notice or report having seen that jacket ever? Its apparent someone cared for the jacket enough to mend it (or have it mended) numerous times and to keep it very clean, so it just seems strange that nobody came forward to ID the jacket when this case was such a big deal? I can understand nobody knowing the shoes, but this jacket was very much unique and would be noticeable so why did nobody report it?

It is odd nobody came forward. Could the owner haved worked away in another state where the news reporting hadn't reached ?

The owner seemed pretty confident just throwing it out the window, burning it would have been my option.

 

[joellegirl]

Evelyn's father did enter the house before calling police. He entered through the basement window, saw Evelyn's shoe. Then went upstairs and found her other shoe and glasses on the carpet. He kept calling for her but no answer. He found the toddler sleeping in her crib in a main floor bedroom. I believe it was the book "Getting Away With Murder" by Ed Baumann that mentioned her father did not use the phone in the house because he thought it may have fingerprints and decided to run across the street and ask the neighbor to call.

 

[punklove]

The owner seemed pretty confident just throwing it out the window, burning it would have been my option.

Another thing I hadnt thought of - why wouldnt they have burned ALL the evidence? Its really odd the person would so carelessly get rid of evidence, tossing it onto a highway where it would be sure to be found quickly or the whole box of bloody shirts thing someone left in the bus station bathroom..

Its almost like the person wanted the evidence to be found.

 

[Robin Hood]

I noticed Krause Konstruction in Coon valley, various building work, steeplejacks etc. Wouldn't it be interesting if we could see if 'Tywee' and friends ever worked there. IIRC some clothing was found in Coon valley.

 

[Robin Hood]

The Wisconsin University were helping farmers combat soil erosion and conservation from the 1930's up to and beyond the 1980's having meetings and doing presentations in La Crosse. Part of the idea was to encourage wildlife alongside farming. Big government grants were up for grabs at a time when farms were struggling with the recession. Maybe Prof Richard Hartley was involved with the wildlife area and that's a connection to Evelyn. Just clutching at straws really.
My father would take me to work with him sometimes, many of his clients knew me as a child.

 

[Claudette]

The Wisconsin University were helping farmers combat soil erosion and conservation from the 1930's up to and beyond the 1980's having meetings and doing presentations in La Crosse. Part of the idea was to encourage wildlife alongside farming. Big government grants were up for grabs at a time when farms were struggling with the recession. Maybe Prof Richard Hartley was involved with the wildlife area and that's a connection to Evelyn. Just clutching at straws really.
My father would take me to work with him sometimes, many of his clients knew me as a child.

Interesting theory! We need to come up with fresh new ideas.

 

[Robin Hood]

See that's the thing Claudette, if connections can be made there are more things to discuss and more theories. LE seem to have more things to do and Evelyn gets pushed down the queue.

Somebody took a big risk in taking Evelyn away when they could quite have, IMO, assulted her in the vicinity and left her.The intention could have been to take her down to the basement for a sexual attack, heard a noise and pushed her out the window. It's possible she may have reconised one of them and in the panic they bungled her off. It could have been too dark to see what they were doing outside and couldn't be sure if they struck/stabbed her she would survive.
I would love to get a listen to the CD made from the taped confession, IMO people on here would be able to tell if it were true due to the fact of how much time they have put in to help Evelyn.

 

[punklove]

I wonder how many workers were involved in building the development that Evelyn was kidnapped from?

 

[joellegirl]

Thinking of Evelyn on the 57th anniversary of her disappearance.
Wishing a break in the case would happen.
Some more recent posts on this thread had some new ideas of what could have happened. Let's keep those new ideas, thoughts etc. coming ! I think the answer may lie in something we haven't really thought of yet, or haven't touched much upon.
Years ago I got some info from the La Crosse Library on the weather details that night. It was approx 37 degrees, clear skies (I believe), no precipitation.
This was before Daylight Savings Time in Wisconsin, so by 7-7:30 pm darkness was quite settled in.

 

[Stella]

If it was 37 degrees outside, that seems pretty chilly for someone to be out, just looking for trouble. I would tend to lean toward the theory that someone planned this crime. But was it planned for Evelyn or the other girl who was supposed to babysit?:waitasec:

 

[joellegirl]

I found the email I got from the La Crosse Library in 2005. The high that day(October 24, 1953, a Saturday) was 56, and the low 37. Perhaps the low of 37 wasn't until much later that night. At 7:00 it may still have been warmer, but I would think it was still quite chilly out, since the sun had set at 4:48 pm (another fact from the library).

 

[Robin Hood]

If it was 37 degrees outside, that seems pretty chilly for someone to be out, just looking for trouble. I would tend to lean toward the theory that someone planned this crime. But was it planned for Evelyn or the other girl who was supposed to babysit?:waitasec:

If it was a last min thing then the attacker/s may have had a shock when they found Evelyn there (if indeed it wasn't random).

I wonder why Evelyn had stopped babysitting for the Rasmussens, makes one wonder if unwanted visitors had called before.

 

[Claudette]

Thinking of Evelyn this holiday season.

 

[md70]

See that's the thing Claudette, if connections can be made there are more things to discuss and more theories. LE seem to have more things to do and Evelyn gets pushed down the queue.

Somebody took a big risk in taking Evelyn away when they could quite have, IMO, assulted her in the vicinity and left her.The intention could have been to take her down to the basement for a sexual attack, heard a noise and pushed her out the window. It's possible she may have reconised one of them and in the panic they bungled her off. It could have been too dark to see what they were doing outside and couldn't be sure if they struck/stabbed her she would survive.
I would love to get a listen to the CD made from the taped confession, IMO people on here would be able to tell if it were true due to the fact of how much time they have put in to help Evelyn.

Taking this opportunity to do my first post. That's a good point that they were taking a huge risk removing her from the scene. My thoughts are also that it seems odd that they would try to hide her body at all. Why not just dump her body any old place? Many times, bodies are left where they are hidden well enough to buy time for the killer but not well enough to never be found. Unless the killer is somehow connected to the victim and they don't want to body to ever be found. I was just thinking perhaps the person(s) who attacked Evelyn either may have known her or planned on kidnapping and keeping her for a while. Just some random thoughts I had.

 

[punklove]

If it was a last min thing then the attacker/s may have had a shock when they found Evelyn there (if indeed it wasn't random). I wonder why Evelyn had stopped babysitting for the Rasmussens, makes one wonder if unwanted visitors had called before.

To make things even more weird Evelyn's parents thought it was quite odd that she would have filled in for her friend that night because it was homecoming and apparently that wasnt something they thought that Evelyn would have ever wanted to miss.

Her father made a big deal out of her not babysitting there for three months prior so I wonder if he knew what the reason was?

 

[punklove]

Taking this opportunity to do my first post. That's a good point that they were taking a huge risk removing her from the scene. My thoughts are also that it seems odd that they would try to hide her body at all. Why not just dump her body any old place? Many times, bodies are left where they are hidden well enough to buy time for the killer but not well enough to never be found. Unless the killer is somehow connected to the victim and they don't want to body to ever be found. I was just thinking perhaps the person(s) who attacked Evelyn either may have known her or planned on kidnapping and keeping her for a while. Just some random thoughts I had.

It was a HUGE risk to take her with them because with the amount of blood she had to be losing she would have gotten it everywhere - on the person, on the persons clothing.. in the persons car..

I have to wonder if they just didnt expect her to be able to outpower them and make it out of the front (or back?) door? She wasnt wounded until she was outside so it could be that the person ran after her, wounded her when he was able to catch her and then went into a panic - he would have three choices at that point. 1) take her back into the home 2) leave her outside or 3) take her with him. The door to the home locked behind them so he would have found a locked door if he tried to get back into the home and you would assume that he wouldnt want to leave her out in the open because of fear of her being found quite quickly so its possible he took her with him because he simply didnt know what else to do.

Luck has certainly been on this persons side, I cant believe nothing has been found of her.

 

[Claudette]

I think we should try to get this case spotlighted on the front page. It is a pretty interesting case with lots of information and puzzle pieces that need to be put together. It would be really cool to get a lot of new people and ideas in this thread. Does anyone know how to do this, or does Trisha and/or the Mods decide on it?

 

[Claudette]

I think this case will be solved eventually. I think the only reason it wasn't is because of the time. I just looked for UIDs found between the day she disappeared and 10 years later. There aren't that many, the only one that could possibly be her is due to lack of info. The UID was found in 1960 but her info was just entered this year. I wouldn't be surprised if Evelyn has been located but it is just a matter of getting the DNA entered and a UID profile created.

 

[joellegirl]

I remember reading in the book Where's Evelyn, that if she was buried where the guys on that tape recording says she was, her remains may be long gone as the area has flooded many times. One article did mention that her scent could still be located in the nearby trees which would be pretty amazing . I guess they mean as her body decomposed, the scent spread to nearby vegetation. soil, trees etc?
I still wonder if law enforcement has even tried looking for her body in this spot.
But of course, these guys may have been telling stories, and had nothing to do with Evelyn. I have often wondered as well if some unidentified body is Evelyn. Since her siblings won't give DNA samples (mentioned in earlier threads), I wonder if there are other decendents of Evelyn, and if anyone even knows how to find them.