Being curious about this case I did a little google-research. I found a few websites including this with the article I post below. But I'm still suspicious. Perhaps this is just a hoax. Dorothy Forstein isn't mentioned on doenetwork, charleyproject or any other missing-persons-page. And the titles of the websites I found don't sound very reliable:
www.book-of-thoth.com
.
This information was shared with us from:
http://www.historyandhauntings.com
Or a book titled: Strange-Unsolved-Mysteries-People-Places where the Forstein story is mentioned along with King Arthur.
Does anybody know whether this story is fact or fiction? And if it is true: Why isnt Dorothy included in any missing-persons-page?
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/article-print-236.html
Written By: Troy Taylor
Posted: 1/27/2004
Many American disappearances are not only mysterious, but are also tinged with tragedy and despair as well. The case of Dorothy Forstein is among the saddest of these stories and is(read more)
also one of the most unusual in this collection of the unsolved.
Mrs.. Forstein vanished from her Philadelphia home in 1950, having been married nine years to her childhood sweetheart, Jules Forstein, a clerk for the Philadelphia City Council at the time of the wedding. Dorothy was a happy, outgoing young woman and the devoted mother of two children. Marcy, an infant, and Merna, age 10, were children from Mr. Forsteins first marriage. His wife had died in childbirth not long before he and Dorothy had gotten together again. This second marriage was a happy one and Forsteins professional life began to prosper when he was made a magistrate in 1943. Another child, Edward, was born a little later.
That idyllic life was shattered on January 25, 1945. Dorothy left the children with neighbors and went out to do some shopping. She reportedly joked with the butcher and chatted with friends as she went about her errands. Later though, her neighbor saw her return home and thought that someone was with her, or walking behind her, as she made her way through the late evening shadows to her front door. It was getting dark and the neighbor, Maria Townley, admitted that she didnt look too close.
Just as Dorothy was entering her three-story brick home, the stranger (or whomever it might have been that Mrs. Townley saw) jumped out of the darkness at her. He began beating her with his fists and some sort of blunt instrument. Dorothy fell to the ground and was pounded into unconsciousness. As she tumbled into the house though, her arm dislodged the hall telephone. In those days of live operators, the voice on the other end of the line heard the commotion and quickly summoned the police. The attacker fled at the sound of approaching sirens.
Police officers arrived moments later and found a battered Dorothy on the floor of the hallway. She had suffered a broken jaw, a shattered nose, a fractured shoulder and a brain concussion. She was rushed to the hospital and when she awakened, she could only weakly explain that someone jumped out at me. I couldnt see who it was. He just hit me and hit me, she said.
Investigators labeled the attack an attempted murder and Captain James A. Kelly of the Philadelphia Homicide Division began trying to put the pieces together. He concluded that it could have only been someone trying to kill Dorothy since no money, jewelry or anything else had been taken from the Forstein home. Jules Forstein himself was investigated but he had an impeachable alibi and the children were too young to have been involved. The case was complicated by the fact that Dorothy had no known enemies and in fact, was one of the most well liked residents in the neighborhood.
Kelly could find no reason for the attack and no suspects were ever arrested. Before long, almost everyone had forgotten about it, except for Dorothy, who was so shaken by what happened that she was never the same again. Her happy and carefree personality was gone and had been replaced by a woman who was nervous and upset, jumping at every noise in the house and checking and rechecking the locks on the doors and windows. She was sure that someone was out to get her - but who?
Jules Forstein was perplexed. He was sure that no one he had come into contact with as a magistrate would bear him enough of a grudge to hurt his wife or his family, and yet he could not explain Dorothys attack either. He seldom left his wife and children alone but on the night of October 18, 1950, he made plans to attend a political banquet. As he was leaving the office, he called his wife to check on her, explaining that he didnt plan to be home too late.
Dorothy replied that everything was fine at home and she joked with him for a moment, finally seeming more like her old self.... Be sure to miss me! she reportedly said just as she was hanging up. Tragically, her words would turn out to be prophetic ones.
Around 11:30 that night, Forstein came home to be greeted by the wails of his two youngest children, Edward and Marcy. They were huddled on the floor, crying and shrieking. Their sister, Merna, was away at a friends house and Dorothy was nowhere to be found. Forstein quickly found out why. The children were crying that their mother was gone!
While surprised that she would have left the children at home by themselves, Forstein assumed that Dorothy was visiting with friends or neighbors. He telephoned for several hours though and no one had seen her. Finally, he called Captain Kelly again and the detective soon started his men checking hospitals, morgues and hotels all over Philadelphia. They worked frantically but no clues were discovered. Kelly went door-to-door in the neighborhood but no one had seen anything. Wherever she was, Dorothy had left her purse, money and keys at home. The front door to the house had been locked.
The only lead came from Marcy Forstein, but her story was so wild that detectives at first dismissed it as nothing more than her frightened and overactive imagination. She told Captain Kelly that she had been awakened and had left her room to see a man coming up the stairs. He went into her mothers room and through a crack in the door, Marcy stated that she could see Dorothy lying facedown on the rug. She looked sick, the little girl offered.
Then, the man, who she described as wearing a brown hat and brown jacket with something sticking out of the pocket, picked up her mother and put her over his shoulder. Dorothy was wearing red silk pajamas and red slippers at the time. Marcy asked the man what he was doing and he replied: Go back to sleep, little one, your mommy has been sick, but she will be all right now.
The man carried Dorothy downstairs and out the front door. He locked the door behind him and vanished. Marcy awakened her brother and they waited together for their father to come home. The little girl told the detectives that she had never seen the man before and had no idea who he was.
As bizarre as this sounded, it was the only possible explanation the police had for Dorothys disappearance. Nothing was disturbed in the house. There was no sign of a struggle and also no sign that anyone else had been there. There was not a single fingerprint in the house that did not belong and the investigators wondered how a man could have walked down the street with a woman in pajamas over his shoulder without someone noticing. And how had he gotten into the locked house anyway? It seemed impossible that the girls story could be true and yet it had to be. If no one had spirited the young woman away, then where had she gone? If she had walked away on her own, why had she not taken her purse or keys with her?
Dorothy Forstein was never seen again. There were no leads, no suspects and no explanations as to who might have taken her or why. She simply vanished - gone without a trace.
This information was shared with us from:
http://www.historyandhauntings.com