Lost Trails

1920

A Department Devoted to Aiding Readers of the Blade in Finding Lost Relatives.

The Blade gladly will publish requests for information of the whereabouts of lost relatives, but cannot inquire for others. Address Lost Trails Editor, W. D. Boyce Company, [their address in 1920].

As soon as you find the person you inquire for, please notify us.

The following inquiries for long lost relatives have been received at the Blade office during the past week:

Mrs. Jane Movety, Shell Lake, Wis., seeks her son, Lloyd Crezo, last heard from in St. Paul, Minn., as a railway man four years ago.

Mrs. Ernest L. Hill, formerly of Hesper, N. D., but now living in Chester, Mont., wishes to learn the address of her son, Ralph Emerson Hill.

Mrs. E. W. Clark, West Huntsville, Ala., asks information concerning her husband, Ernest W. Clark, last heard from in Dallas, Texas, in 1917.

Anna E. Shepherd, box 207, Slovan, Pa., seeks her uncle, Jerry Burgess, who left for Cincinnati, Ohio, fifteen years ago and has never been heard from since.

Mrs. Lee Spain, Gen. Del., Yakima, Wash., seeks her brother and mother, lost from her when she was a little girl. Her mother was known as Sis Floyd and was last heard from near Dabney, Ky., twenty years ago. The writer's maiden name was Vera Floyd.

Brother and Sister Lost.

A. R. Halpainy, 35 St. Hedwigs avenue, Dunkirk, N. Y., is searching for his brother and sister, Raymond and Rose Halpainy. His mother died twenty-one years ago and he was adopted in New York, became separated from the rest of the family and has heard nothing from them since.

Mrs. Inez Allen, Xenia, Ohio, is anxious to learn the whereabouts of her brother, James Kingery, 40, last heard from in Cleveland, Ohio, fourteen years ago.

Mrs. Maggie Hemenway, Rush Center, Kan., would like to learn where her uncles, Ben and Hi Lansing, are located now. They were last heard from in Washington, D. C., forty years ago.

Mrs. Jack Conley, Gen. Del., Omaha, Neb., seeks her husband, Jack Conley, 21, formerly of the 18th M. G. Bn., 6th Division, who disappeared soon after his discharge from the Army in June.

Young Bride Loses Husband.

Mrs. William L. P. Baker, East Point, Ga., asks information concerning her husband, who left home on Nov. 24, 1919, with a promise to write next day, and has not been heard from since. The couple had been married but a year and had had a happy wedded life, and the young bride fears foul play, as her husband left home with a considerable sum of money. Can Blade readers give her information concerning her husband?

D. S. Hounshell, Crockett, Va., is trying to find his brother, Carroll L. Hounshell, last heard from in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1912.

Mrs. Flo Brand, R. F. D. 3, Millington, Mich., is endeavoring to learn the present location of her brother-in-law, Warren Arthur Swindler, last heard of about fifteen years ago at Huron, S. D.

Mrs. Charles Hanson, Rice Lake, Wis.. wants to find her sister, Mary Elf, last heard of at Woodstock, Ill., about sixteen years ago.

Miss Jennie Zackry, 503 Wafford street, Cartersville. Ga., is trying to find her father who left her when she was a little baby. His name is Thomas Zackry; last heard of in Little Rock, Ark.

Bert Siar, 733 Lincoln street, St. Marys, Pa., asks the Blade to help him find Clifford Siar, last heard of in Elkins, W. Va., nine years ago. He is a blacksmith. His mother, Mrs. Nanny Siar, is very anxious to hear from him.

Lost Ones Previously Mentioned.

Mike Bartos. Sought by Mike G. Korman of Sublet, Wyo., his brother-in-law.

Michael J. Dolan. Sought by Mrs M. J. Dolan. Friendship, N. Y., his wife.

Andrew Jackson O'Neal. Sought by Kizzie O'Neal, Quitman, Ga., his daughter.

Ward (full name not given). Sought by Gertrude Gunter, Middletown, Ohio, his sister.

Mrs. Ray Allison. Sought by Mrs. Grace McVey, Mt. Pulaski, Ill., her sister.

John W. Owenby. Sought by J. C. Holcomb, Greenville, Texas, his nephew.

Wade King. Sought by Miss Mary Margaret King, Wyandotte, Mich., his daughter.

Cook brothers, Nathan and Thomas. Sought by James Harrison Cook, Warrensburg, Ill. Mary Elizabeth, a sister, requested to respond.

James Biely, a mute. Sought by Miss Sophia Biely, Iron River, Mich., his daughter.

George N. Neckard. Sought by Mrs. Isaac Neckard, Lebanon, Pa., his mother.

John Eward Shannon. Sought by Mrs. Pete Sutton, Clinton, Ind., his mother.

Relatives of Mable Knox. Sought by Mrs. Mable Knox Bullard, Greensburg, Kan.

Fannie White, nee Loudermilk. Sought by Mrs. Mamie Bray, Sheldon Hotel, El Paso, Texas, her sister.

William Marks Arehart. Sought by Mrs. Effie Coons, Baxter Springs, Kan., his sister.

John C. Vuncanon. Sought by Miss Linnie Vuncanon, High Point, N. C., his sister.

Husband of Mrs. Ella Jones. Sought by Mrs. Ella Jones, Bokhoma, Okla.

Brother of Miss Elma Hornbuckle. Sought by Miss Emma Hornbuckle, Crossett, Ark.

Herman Wrought. Sought by Charles W. Wrought, Morris, Okla., his son.

J. E. Murphy. Sought by Mrs. Ella Hammer, Bowler, Wis., his sister.

Curtis Winn. Sought by Mrs. Moore, Long Pine, Neb., his cousin.

John Odgers. Sought by Mrs. Elizabeth Northley, Morhland, Utah, his sister.

James V. Lindsay. Sought by Laurie Nutt, Macon, Ga., his sister.

James William Studebaker. Sought by George W. Studebaker, Centropolis, Kan., a relative.

William Cotlin. Sought by Edward G. Paulsen, Swea City, Iowa, a relative.


HEARS FROM SON

Mother's Aching Heart Gladdened Thru Saturday Blade Efforts.

MY SON has been found — and all thru your excellent paper," writes Mrs. C. D. King, Lagrange, Ga., to the Lost Trails Editor of the Blade. "I might never have known he was even living if it had not been for your help, but I am now receiving letters from him every day.

"May I not thank you for helping to relieve a mother's breaking heart, as I had almost given up all hopes, until I learned of the wonderful results achieved thru The Saturday Blade."

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 12.

Note: I made a few corrections through the course of this article. But all the names and places were left the same.

Dr. Arthur Lachman: Dec. 4, 1873-Nov. 30, 1957

(Click graphic for better view.)

1920

Big Reward for Missing Man

Harold Lachman of Chicago, whose present address is 358 Holbrook building, San Francisco, Cal., at latest reports from him had not succeeded in finding his missing brother, Prof. Arthur Lachman, who disappeared from San Francisco several weeks ago, as stated in the Blade's columns last week. As the Blade then explained, a large cash reward is offered to any one who can furnish information that will lead to the present whereabouts of the missing man, who is a distinguished chemist. He is believed to have wandered away while under an attack of forgetfulness due to overwork. He is 50 years old, of medium height and weighs about 165 pounds. He wears a short sandy mustache, is a learned man and kindly in his manners. Any Blade reader meeting such a man will do well to ask him if he is not Prof. Arthur Lachman of San Francisco. Whoever discovers him will receive a generous reward.

—From the "Lost Trails" column of The Saturday Blade, Chicago, "A Department Devoted to Aiding Readers of the Blade in Finding Lost Relatives," Jan. 3, 1920, p. 12.



Dr. Lachman Tells Story of Amnesia

1920

San Franciscan, Missing Six Months and Mourned As Dead, Returns Home After "Finding" Himself at Chico

Scientist, for Whom Country Was Searched, Cannot Give An Account of Wanderings Nor Explain Scar on Face

As one who had returned from the grave, Dr. Arthur Lachman, distinguished scientist of San Francisco, who has been missing for six months and has been mourned as dead, is today seeking to adjust himself to his old surroundings. Lachman, according to his wife, and to a brother-in-law, Morris Ballen of Berkeley, has been a sufferer of amnesia and it was not until yesterday that he regained his mental faculties.

The search for Lachman has extended throughout the country for the last half year and has been furthered by the posting of a reward of $1000 for information concerning the missing man. "When one clew after another failed Mrs. Lachman became convinced that her husband had met with death and withdrew the reward two weeks ago.

BROTHER RECEIVES FIRST INFORMATION

Yesterday Charles Lachman, a brother, received the following telegram from Chico:

"Leaving Chico. Due San Francisco 6:30 p. m. Cannot understand matters."

When the message was received at the Lachman home, 143 Fourteenth avenue, San Francisco, Mrs. Lachman notified her brother in Berkeley and arrangements were made to meet Lachman.

Worn and shabby, but with his mental faculties apparently restored, Lachman arrived at his home and was the center of a dramatic reunion with his wife and fourteen-year-old daughter. He said that he awakened yesterday morning to find himself in strange surroundings.

"When I asked a pedestrian where I was," Lachman told his wife, "he said the place was Chico. Then to my astonishment I learned that the date was May 19. Unable to account for my being in Chico I decided to telegraph my brother. I am glad to be home. It seems like the end of a bad dream."

It is believed a fall or shock in Chico served to restore the mental balance of the scientist, although at Chico it is said that there is no knowledge there of any accident to the man. A new scar on Lachman's forehead cannot be explained by him.

LACHMAN REMAINS AT HOTEL FOUR DAYS

According to Night Clerk Don McLain of the Hotel Oaks at Chico, Lachman registered at the hotel there on May 15 as "A. Lachman, San Francisco," and ordered his meals served in his rooms. After a day passed in bed he appeared occasionally, and there was nothing abnormal in his actions, the clerk said. At one time he said he had just completed a vaudeville tour. Tuesday night he attended a motion picture show and announced that he would check out for San Francisco in the morning.

"Where Lachman has been since December 11, 1919, until the time he registered at Chico a few days ago is a mystery to him and to his family. In response to the nationwide appeal he had been reported in various places about the country. He has carried insurance policies amounting to $115,000.

—Oakland Tribune, Oakland, CA, May 20, 1920, p. 1.


Death

1957

NEW YORK (UP) — Dr. Arthur Lachman, 83, former associate professor of chemistry at the University of California at Berkeley, died Saturday in a hospital here. The San Francisco native also had taught at the University of Michigan and the University of Oregon. He discovered the Lachman process for refining crude petroleum in 1929.

—Hammond Times, Hammond, Louisiana, Dec. 2, 1957, p. 10.

Note: "Saturday" was Nov. 30. Pronounced Lok'man (with a dot over the "a," which I think would be Lok'mun), according to Who's Who in America 1950-51, born Dec. 4, 1873 in San Francisco. Obit for him was published in the NY Times, Dec. 1, 1957, p. 88, with an erratum of some sort on Dec. 2, 1957, p. 27. The obit info is from Biography Index, Sept. 1955-Aug. 1958.

The photo credits are: Top: From The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 12. Bottom: From The Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, Vol. 12, No. 2, p. 198. Information on Dr. Lachman's books can be found at Google Books. This is the link for the "Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry" graphic (pdf).

A Lost Freight Car

1901

It Disappeared From the Middle of the Train

The mysterious disappearance of freight car No. 4849 from the center of a moving train between way stations on the Santa Fe road made a lot of trouble for two train crews in last March and puzzled the officials of the road not a little. The car was loaded with fruit for the eastern market and dropped out of sight midway on the journey without damage to the rest of the train and without any one having seen it go. Tracers were sent out, but the car was not to be found on siding or in depot yard.

The tracers' reports showed that the car had been loaded with select oranges on a spur leading to a well known fruit packer's establishment in the San Gabriel Valley, California. It was a new car, equipped with all the modern cold storage appliances. It was joined to a train of cars of the same class, all loaded with fruit and all destined for the same market.

The heavy train had wound its way without incident over the Sierra Madre and the Sierra Nevadas, up the gradual slopes, across the continental divide, through many villages and over sagebush plains and sandy deserts. It had toiled through eastern California, Arizona and a part of New Mexico, it had climbed the rugged steeps of the Rockies, plunged into and through the, great tunnel at the crest of that range and started on its downward flight to Trinidad.

That was as far as the tracers had been able to track it, for in Baton, a division station on the Santa Fe, No. 4849 had been noted in the conductor's report when the train was turned over to a new crew. Yet when the train reached Trinidad No. 4849 was missing, and no trace of it could be found between Trinidad and Baton. For all that the tracers knew, No. 4849 might have been whisked up into the air by balloon and transported to some foreign land.

A lot of discharges had been made out for the members of the two freight crews, and there was trouble in the air, threats of strikes and all that sort of thing because of the injustice done to the men, when suddenly the mystery was cleared up. A cowboy reported a strange find on his range, and it turned out to be the missing freight car. No. 4849 was lying at the base of a precipitous cliff in a thicket of underbrush, with its sides distended, its roof bulging and a confused mass of choice oranges appearing through the clefts of its wrecked outlines. The car was on its side, dismounted from its trucks, a mass of ruins, with its contents preserved by the crisp mountain air under a cloudless sky.

The train, in its rapid descent at sharp curve, had broken the flanges of a set of wheels, and the car was thrown from the track.

Bumping over the rough roadbed and ties had detached the couplings at either end, and the disabled car rolled down the stoop embankment to the valley, hundreds of feet below. The train being on the down grade, the rear section soon closed up the gap, and by means of the automatic couplers had again become attached to the front section, all unknown to the train crew. Thus No. 4849 dropped out of account, leaving its disappearance a deep mystery. — New York Press.

Braves Surgeon's Knife; Balks at Facing Altar

1920

NEW YORK, N. Y., Jan. 1. — Dr. William Gray Vermilye, 62, a former naval surgeon, did not flinch when he was called upon to face the surgeon's knife in a Brooklyn hospital. But when it came to leading Miss Ruth M. Keeney, 35, to the altar he balked. In fact, he disappeared on the day he was to have been married and sought the hospital to have a minor operation performed rather than face the preacher with his intended bride.

Dr. Vermilye was found by Miss Keeney, who was on the verge of collapse. She carried a bouquet for him and sent to his room a request that he see her.

He refused.

Miss Keeney fainted.

Interviewers were unable to get a statement out of the physician for quite awhile. Finally he issued a prepared statement to the effect that on his return from South America recently he was met with an invitation to his own wedding. He denied he was hiding from any one, but intimated that he just didn't have the nerve to get married after living in single blessedness so long.

Returns From the Dead

1900

Baltimore, Jan. 6 — A special dispatch to The Sun from Williamsport, Pa., says that William Shook has returned to Williamsport alive and well after being mourned as dead for over 13 years.

Shook's wife of former days married again during his absence, believing that he was no longer alive. During the fall of 1886 Shook left his home unexpectedly and no trace of him could be found. Eight years after Shook's disappearance his wife wedded again, her choice being Joseph Johnson, a carpenter.

The first intelligence received by relatives in this city that Shook was alive was in a letter received during the past summer from the United States pension department. Shook had applied for a pension, and the authorities were inquiring as to his war record. Shook has spent the time in Virginia and Maryland.

Many Persons Drop from Sight.

"The most remarkable instance of disappearance ever known," were the words used by a detective a few days ago when speaking of a case he was employed upon. It was not a haphazard expression, nor was it original, for it has been used of many in the list of those who have mysteriously disappeared. A report of the Commissioner of Police of London recently noted that 174 men and women of that city had sunk out of sight of their friends in the year. Many persons disappear every year in this city. One of the most remarkable cases of disappearance was that of Lieutenant Edward W. Remey of the navy, a brother of Judge Advocate General William B. Remey and Rear Admiral George C. Remey. The last seen of him was when he walked down the gangplank of the steamship Roanoke in this city on Feb. 17, 1887. Every effort was made to find him, but no trace was discovered. Had he been a man of irregular habits there might have been some suspicion as to the cause of his disappearance, but he was a sober, straightforward officer, and no officer had a better record, stood higher in the profession or was more greatly esteemed.

Another naval officer who disappeared a few years ago was ex-Passed Assistant Engineer Richard H. Buel, an officer who had served in the civil war with distinction. He started for Boston on Dec. 20, 1889, after which no trace of him could be discovered. His father was the Rev. Samuel Buel, at one time dean of the General theological Seminary of this city.

There are many who will recall Stillman S. Conant, one of the editors of Harper's Weekly, who started from his sanctum for his home in Brooklyn on Jan. 16, 1885, and though search was made for him in various parts of the United States and Europe, where he was reported to have been seen, nothing about him has ever been learned.

Thomas W. Fisher's disappearance more than ten years ago attracted a great deal of interest. He was a real estate broker in Washington, and, as was his usual custom, he one evening went to Baltimore to visit the young woman to whom he was engaged. The couple became involved in a dispute over a trivial matter, and the young woman declared their engagement off. Mr. Fisher left the house, and, after wandering about the streets for some time, left Baltimore for New York. He at once wrote to his former fiancee, apologizing for his rude conduct and begging her forgiveness, but she was bent upon punishing him and did not reply to his letter. Fisher then left New York and went to Albany, from which place he wrote again to the young woman, saying that he would not burden her again with his petitions, and that he intended to commit suicide. The young woman then replied to his letter and asked his forgiveness, but the letter was returned with the stamp upon it, "Not found," and nothing has been heard from the young man since that day. -- New York Tribune.

--The Sioux County Bee, Rock Valley, Iowa, July 10, 1903, page 3.