Identified! Boulder Jane Doe--Identified--Dorothy Gay Howard

[WholeLottaRosie]

Bumping up for BJD. Anything new? Silvia - what happened to the forum on the BJD site?

[Silvia]

Thanks for asking about www.boulderjanedoe.com. The website is still there, but I had to deactivate the message board, as it was getting 10-20 spam messages per day. I'm sure there is a way around that problem, but the message board served its purpose, and people with questions are welcome to email me directly.

[WholeLottaRosie]

Arghh. I hate spammers.

What could someone be doing now to help you?

[shadowangel]

On November 8th, 1961, 16 year-old Sandra Lee Smith was walking from her home in Aurora, CO, to a baton-twirling class. A man in a red and black Ford sedan with Wyoming plates stopped and offered her $5 for her help in locating an address. The man, calling himself "Dr. Allen", then forced her into his car. He drove a short distance into the country and beat her savagely. The man then forced her into the trunk of his car, drove another short distance, and again beat Sandra. He then shot her twice in the head with a .22 handgun, once in the eye and once in the temple.
Miraculously, Sandra survived the attack. She crawled from the field where she had been left, and along a roadway. She was later found by hunters, and taken for medical attention. Sandra lost her eye and all her toes due to frostbite, but survived the ordeal.
Sandra was able to give police details of her attacker. Another girl in the area also reported being approached by a man meeting the same description, calling himself "Dr. Truman Allen".
Through the information given by Sandra and other details not released, police were able to indentify a suspect.
Alfred Wesley Ratzloff, 42, originally from Kansas, was living in the Casper WY. He had been arrested for robbing a bank in Kansas in 1957, but was ruled incompetent to stand trial and placed in a state hospital. Police in the Denver area put out an all-points bulletin for Ratzloff. A car meeting the description of the one he was operating was reported in Kansas. As police closed in, a house in a residential area of Witchita exploded on November 30th. Inside, severely injured but alive, was Alfred Ratzloff.
Ratzloff eventually confessed to the attack on Sandra, and was the state hospital in Pueblo in May of '62.

Before and during the time of the trial, authorities from Colorado, New Mexico and Texas questioned Ratzloff about other murders that were similar in nature to the attack on Sandra. He was not charged in any of the cases.

Boulder is some 35 miles from Aurora.

[Silvia]

Medusa kindly asked what people could do to help in the Boulder Jane Doe case. We would love to find a blood relative of Katharine E. Farrand Dyer, born 14 Oct 1926 in San Antonio TX. However, this information that she provided on her marriage affidavit may be false (or she could have been using a fake name, or been adopted, or her birth not recorded), as no one "fits" as her family. We have eliminated so many names that were close, etc. I now believe that she didn't have a family when she disappeared, and that's why her body never was claimed. However, anyone who thinks he/she may have found a connection, please email me at pettem@earthlink.net. Thanks.

[WholeLottaRosie]

Thanks, Silvia! Will keep trying on it. Question, do you have a subscription to Newspaper Archives? I am working on searching there, but, if someone else is already doing so, hate to waste time duplicating efforts?

[Silvia]

Thanks for offering to search on Newspaper Archives. I appreciate it! I do have a subscription to Ancestry.com that includes newspaper searches, but I don't know if that's the same as subscribing directly to Newspaper Archives. Is it? Anyway, I am glad for any help to find the family of Katharine E. Farrand who married Jimmie Dyer. Thanks again.

[shadowangel]

The more people look in the archives, the better...Different search terms can yield vastly different results. Keep in mind, the search engine hits on direct matches....If the copy is of low quality (one of the 'r's in 'Farrand' doesnt show up in the newsprint) the search engine may not return a hit. Likewise, different wording on search phrases will result in different hits.

[shadowangel]

Has it ever been mentioned or discussed as to whether there was indication that BJD had even given birth?

[Silvia]

In Boulder Jane Doe's original autopsy, on the day her body was found, the pathologist said that there was "no indication of a past pregnancy." Also, after exhumation, when a forensic anthropologist reassembled her remains, he said he could tell from her pelvic bones that she had not given birth. (FYI: Katharine E. Farrand Dyer did not have any children.)

[shadowangel]

Thanks, Silvia. I found another missing woman, last known to be in Casper Wyoming in early '54, but she had had a child in '50. (Then again, I'm assuming the child mentioned was hers by birth and not marriage).

[Silvia]

Can you provide more info on the WY woman (with the child)? Name, etc.? I am keeping a list, whether they seem like good candidates for Boulder Jane Doe or not. Thanks.

[shadowangel]

Her name was Donna Lowe. There wasn't a lot of info I could find, it was an article from the '70s about her mother in MI still looking for information on her.
Donna left her husband in SC in early '54, enroute to WA to stay with her father. Her husband was supposed to follow her sometime later, but it appears he never did. Donna was known to have been in a hotel in in Casper WY in early '54. At some point, and it isn't specified where, she left her 4 year-old son at a police dep't and told him to tell the police that his mommy couldn't care for him anymore.
Donna was though to have taken up with an unnamed Korean War veteran. According to the article, her mother never heard from her after she left SC.

[Cambria]

I have a subscription to newspaperarchives.com. I looked briefly for info on Katharine under Farrand and Dyer but couldn't find anything yet. I will look again a little later when I have some more free time.

[Silvia]

The problem with newspapers.com is that they don't include the Denver CO papers of the early 1950s, which is where Katharine disappeared from in 1954. I've read months of the actual papers on microfilm and never found any mention of her again, after having disappeared shortly before Jane Doe's body was found.

[Cambria]

Originally Posted by Silvia

The problem with newspapers.com is that they don't include the Denver CO papers of the early 1950s, which is where Katharine disappeared from in 1954. I've read months of the actual papers on microfilm and never found any mention of her again, after having disappeared shortly before Jane Doe's body was found.

I know..they only have certain papers and if you do happen to find a paper you're looking for, then they don't have the dates you need! Sometimes I think about cancelling my subscription but I always keep it just on the slim hope I'll find something!

[WholeLottaRosie]

Originally Posted by MaryBeth

I have a subscription to newspaperarchives.com. I looked briefly for info on Katharine under Farrand and Dyer but couldn't find anything yet. I will look again a little later when I have some more free time.

I have spent HOURS and have found nothing. But, I really believe this will be solved, so I keep on when I have time.

[Cambria]

http://www.timescall.com/news_story.asp?ID=11338

[Stella]

Ms. Farrand-Dyer's photo should be sent out to all wire services where newspapers, big and small will hopefully publish it. It must be just a matter of the right person or persons seeing the photo or recognizing her name and telling authorities.

[Silvia]

The following has just been published in the Boulder Daily Camera:
We are continuing our search for family of Katharine E. Farrand Dyer.

Thanks to all, Silvia

"Jane Doe" reburied in her former grave, by Silvia Pettem

Boulder's historic Columbia Cemetery is nearly full, so it's rare to have a burial and rarer still for a body or human remains to be interred a second time. But history was repeated on Sept. 9, when Jane Doe was returned to her former grave. The female murder victim was remembered by an "extended family" of people who continue to care for her. Again she rests in peace.

Jane Doe was the name given to a slender young woman whose naked and beaten body was found by two hikers in Boulder Canyon on April 8, 1954. Her face had been ravaged (by animals) beyond recognition, and intense publicity failed to bring forward anyone who knew her. Local citizens called her their "mystery girl," and they raised the funds for a plot, gravestone, and Christian funeral.

"We don't know who she was or what religion she followed," stated Coroner George Howe at the time. "We can only do what we think is right."

Fifty years later, in June 2004, the Boulder County Sheriff's Office exhumed Jane Doe's remains in the hopes that she could finally be identified with modern forensics. Her casket had disintegrated underground, and each bone was removed piece by piece -- a two-day process that resembled an archeological dig.

The victim's DNA was extracted from one of her teeth, and the subsequent profile was funded by another generation of generous donors. The process ruled out two missing women -- Marion Joan McDowell and Twylia May Embrey. A forensic anthropologist reassembled Jane Doe's skull, and a forensic artist sculpted a facial reconstruction, shown to a national audience on the television show "America's Most Wanted."

A group of six researchers, connected by the Internet but spread out all over the country, then began to whittle down a list of missing young women, finally settling on Katharine E. Farrand Dyer. The Denver elevator operator's physical description matched that of the victim, and she had been reported missing 13 days before Jane Doe's body was found. After that, her trail stopped cold.

Five months ago, a forensic anthropologist at Michigan State University compared Dyer's photograph to a cast of Jane Doe's reassembled skull. The two images matched so closely that Dyer could not be ruled out as Jane Doe.

Investigators today have much more information on Jane Doe than did their predecessors in 1954, but no family members of Dyer's have been found, so no DNA comparison has been made.

The Sheriff's Office was in charge of the re-interment, in coordination with Boulder City Parks officials who maintain Columbia Cemetery. Crist Mortuary generously provided a casket and vault and arranged for the opening and closing of the grave. A brief graveside service was officiated by Rev. Andy Wineman, a chaplain from the Boulder County Sheriff's Office.

Red gladioli from Sturtz & Copeland Florists were placed on her grave and replicated the same flowers sent "to someone's daughter" in 1954.

Although Dyer's name cannot be engraved on her stone until a positive DNA identification is made, the case remains open and a search for the victim's family continues.

To reach Silvia Pettem, write her at the Camera, P.O. Box 591, Boulder 80306, or e-mail pettem@earthlink.net.

[shadowangel]

For all the searching I've done, all I've been able to find is a reference to a "Miss Katherine (not Katharine) Farrand", in a Florida paper dated June 1947. Her father was Hiram Farrand, who had a "summer home in Berlin, NH".

[Silvia]

Thanks for all of your searching. We found this one, too, and have ruled her out. Yes, Katherine Louise Farrand was the daughter of Hiram A. and Elizabeth Allen Farrand. This Katherine was born 14 April 1909 and died 22 March 1994. The Katharine Farrand we are looking for was born (according to her marriage affidavit) 14 Oct 1926. (Or, possibly, the year could have been in error and she could have been born as late as 1930.) Thanks.

[Cambria]

Here's another new article. Thanks for releasing a new photo of Katharine Farrand Dyer in the article, Silvia.

Mysterious murder victim reburied in Colorado

By P. SOLOMON BANDA – 2 hours ago
DENVER (AP) — The exhumed remains of a mysterious woman killed in 1954 have been reburied without an answer to who she was, but some people believe they're close.
Investigators argue the remains are those of a Denver woman who had been reported missing just days before the battered, nude body of a woman in her 20s was found along a Boulder Canyon creek on April 8, 1954. There is even speculation that she may have been the victim of a serial killer.

More at link.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h...5S6MgD93HK7L80

[WholeLottaRosie]

I saw that article in a paper in the St Louis area. Nice to see it is getting wide spread release, with the picture of KFD. Maybe someone will recognize her. I keep hoping!!!

[UMfanforever]

Pretty impressive getting an AP article. congrats, Silvia!