OH OH - Bertha Marie Tidd Newell, 40, Zanesville, 13 July 1948

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Bertha Marie Tidd Newell
Missing since July 13, 1948 from Zanesville, Ohio.
Classification: Endangered Missing

Vital Statistics

Date Of Birth: September 26, 1907
Age at Time of Disappearance: 40 years old
Height and Weight at Time of Disappearance: 5'8 - 5'10, 125 - 145 lbs.
Distinguishing Characteristics: White female. Dark brown hair; dark brown eyes.
Marks, Scars: Scar on head just behind crown
Clothing: She was last seen wearing a brown tweed dress and high heels
AKA: Bertha Marie Tidd, Marie Newell; Marie Tidd
Medical Conditions: She had some mental health issues before her disappearance and stayed in an Ohio state mental hospital for a brief period.

Circumstances of Disappearance

On July 13, 1948 Newell told her family she was going to the grocery store. She never returned and has never been seen again. She didn't take her purse nor any other personal belongings.

After her disappearance, there were numerous stories circulating; That she ran away to join a travelling circus, that her husband may have murdered her and a possibility she was in a nursing home in Woodfield. None of these were substantiated.

In 1956, there was a report that she had been seen in a town north of Zanesville. After some investigation, the police reached a dead-end. There has been no real leads since and Newell is no longer on file with the Zanesville Police Department.
Newell had given birth to 10 children.

Investigators
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:

Dorothy Daugherty

E-Mail: daughertydm@hotmail.com

Source:
The Doe Network: Case File 1119DFOH

LINK:

http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1119dfoh.html
 
I find the rumor about a nursing home interesting. Was Newell known to have mental health issues (depression, etc.)?
 
Bertha Marie Tidd Newell has been missing since July 1948 from Zanesville, Ohio born Sept,26 1907 in Moundsville, W/Va mother was Jenny Blanche Gessel father was Harry A Tidd she married Ernest R Newell in Zanesville, Ohio in 1926-27 sure would like any information any-one may have on her also she may have been travling with a carnival worker?????
http://genforum.genealogy.com/tidd/messages/224.html

a little background info here
 
So she left and didn't take her purse (which I assume had her money in it) when heading to the store? Sounds planned perhaps, whether it was premeditated or planned on the fly. The first post commented that she had mental health issues. I wonder what exactly those were and if they ever caused her to act out of character or oddly in the past?

I also wonder if she did go elsewhere due to her mental condition, if maybe she met with foul play or misadventure? It sounds to me like leaving her purse indicated plans other than going to shop (unless that was a normal habit for her?).
 
iowalovescaylee said:
She had 10 children? Are any of them actively looking for answers on this? Very little information. Seems like she just vanished and everyone was ok with it.
Click to expand...

If she was suffering from mental illness, then there might have been silence from the family because of the stigma of mental illness during those days. Does anyone know if her local grocery store had a credit policy (ie. get the groceries and tell the grocer to put it on the account, bill comes later)? This is the only reason I could imagine someone would go to the store without their purse. Otherwise, I agree with everyone else-she planned to leave and not come back.

I have read in some of these other threads from this era that there was a white slavery ring operating in OH and PA during these years. I wonder if that was a possibility? I sure hope not, but when I saw her location, it was the first thing that came to mind.
 
iowalovescaylee said:
She had 10 children? Are any of them actively looking for answers on this? Very little information. Seems like she just vanished and everyone was ok with it.
Click to expand...

Dorothy who has an email near the bottom of the OP here in this thread is still actively looking for her on the internet. I'm in the process of digging and Dorothy's posts keep popping up and some are dated as of this year.


ETA: I didn't find anything. I did see where one of her daughters has passed away within that last decade.
 
Kat said:
Dorothy who has an email near the bottom of the OP here in this thread is still actively looking for her on the internet. I'm in the process of digging and Dorothy's posts keep popping up and some are dated as of this year.


ETA: I didn't find anything. I did see where one of her daughters has passed away within that last decade.
Click to expand...

Kat, any progress since you last posted? Just curious!
 
It seems the granddaughter was still looking as of 2003 and may have found a possibly other last name for Bertha - HAEFT.

Does anyone know the names of the sons of Bertha? I do not have ancestry access right now, so am having a hard time. There is an obit for Bertha Haeft here:
https://news.google.com/newspapers?...AIBAJ&sjid=9QIEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6348,5603320&hl=en
that lists some sons names, but those could also be the names of her husband's children.

ETA: - I believe I found this Clarence and Bertha in the 1940 census, and therefor can't be her since she was missing in 1948! :/
 
marie-chantal said:
I have read in some of these other threads from this era that there was a white slavery ring operating in OH and PA during these years. I wonder if that was a possibility? I sure hope not, but when I saw her location, it was the first thing that came to mind.
Click to expand...

I would be very surprised if a 40 year old woman, with a body that had borne 10 kids, would be of any interest whatsoever to a white slavery ring, even if they existed. And I'm not convinced of that.
 
There was an unknown, murdered lady found on Shaw Island (near West Pittsburgh, PA) on May 18, 1952. This is 156 miles from Zanesville.

She was white, 40-45 years old. I know of this case only because it was briefly mentioned in Jeffrey Jones' self-published book "The Butchered."

I wonder if she was ever compared to Newall? BTW, Dorothy Daugherty's email appears to be defunct.
 
VikingBookLady said:
There was an unknown, murdered lady found on Shaw Island (near West Pittsburgh, PA) on May 18, 1952. This is 156 miles from Zanesville.

She was white, 40-45 years old. I know of this case only because it was briefly mentioned in Jeffrey Jones' self-published book "The Butchered."

I wonder if she was ever compared to Newall? BTW, Dorothy Daugherty's email appears to be defunct.
Click to expand...
Did you submit?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk
 
I wonder if her reported mental health issues pre-dated or post-dated her seemingly endless stream of pregnancies. Perhaps she had had enough of being used as a breeding machine.
 
What did her husband do after her disappearance? Presumably in due course he had her declared dead, but did he ever remarry? Even if he was carrying on with a mistress while still married, I find it hard to believe that any woman would want to be saddled with her predecessor's 10 kids, even if many would have been adults by then.
 
I was curious as to the mention of scars around the crown of her head... this along with the talk of mental health issues made me think of a lobotomy. Not the Freeman method of an ice pick to the eye socket, but the prefrontal that leaves visible scarring. These were all the rage during the time period.
 
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