Identified! OR - Ashland, WhtMale 1144UMOR, 1-2, in reservoir, Down Syndrome, Jul'63 - Stevie Crawford

[Anirtak]

May you run and play Stevie. Sweet dreams.

 

[Laura456]

So tragic. I'm glad we now have more resources for parents who are struggling with caring for a special needs child. Mother should have left him at a fire station (I assume that was an option back then)

 

[Suglo]

So tragic. I'm glad we now have more resources for parents who are struggling with caring for a special needs child. Mother should have left him at a fire station (I assume that was an option back then)

I don’t think it was an option in the 60s. I know it wasn’t an option here in California until September of 2000. And even then you can only abandon a baby that is less than 72 hours old and hasn’t been abused.

 

[Grungster]

I can't bear the thought of a kid with Down Syndrome being killed. This makes me so angry and sad.

RIP Stevie. I can only hope you are out of whatever pain you must have gone through.

 

[Susikatze]

We are victim advocates and i am thrilled little Stevie gets his name back at least.
Everybody blames the mother but it may not even have been her but her partner. Also, in the 1960s, having a child with special needs was still a very heavy stigma on a parent. We have no information if she was in a relationship or had to fend for herself.

Maybe Stevies father left her once it was clear the child had Downs. She may have had a depression. Today there are plenty resources (still not enough but in the 60s there were none) to assist families with a DS child. Also help with education and taking care of the medical issues a DS child may have. DS children back then either passed away after birth from untreated heart defects or feeding issues (it was before NICU and pediatric cardiac surgery) or if they had no health issues aside from the DS (which I assume is the case with Stevie), were hardly ever raised in their families but put into mental health facilities... very subpar standards.
She may have had to fight for her own survival, not able to remarry or even work with a special needs child.
We simply do not know what drove her to kill her baby - if she did it. Stevie was well dressed, taken care of and wrapped almost lovingly. He was not just dumped. Very very tragic.

I think the whole case is a reflection of the tragic inability of the state and society back then to help a mother and her special needs baby.

Poor little Stevie. You were born half a century too early. You deserved better. And your mom deserved help as well.

Smile on in heaven, little sunshine.

 

[ChatteringBirds]

Not sorry to say, I don't understand this mindset.
Choose to leave him in a hospital waiting room, a church, a school, etc. and walk away.
That's so difficult, or what?

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

I am beyond overjoyed that Stevie got his name back! This gives me more hope for other older children cased like Boy in the Box getting solved.

I have been reading the Reddit thread on Stevie's case and several good points are made. So the 60's was still a time where people sent their disabled children away to institutions. These institutions weren't exposed until 1972 when Geraldo did his piece on Willowbrook. So when his mother told family, "we won't have to worry about him anymore" they probably thought he was placed in an institution. At the time it was commonplace and encouraged to do so. These institutions were typically located in rural areas far from cities so maybe family thought visiting wasn't an option? I know my grandmother was one of about 13 children with only 10 accounted for. When I was on Ancestry I found a census for the early 20's with a brother that my grandmother didn't recognize at all. She was told that a couple of siblings died in infancy before she was born but it still makes me wonder.

"A Brief Timeline of the History of Disabilities: The Shameful Treatment of People with Disabilities

I wonder if a picture of Little Stevie will turn up.

 

[Susikatze]

Not sorry to say, I don't understand this mindset.
Choose to leave him in a hospital waiting room, a church, a school, etc. and walk away.
That's so difficult, or what?

There was no law about giving children up to public places like that in the 60s. There has since the beginning of time however been an unspoken policy of church asylum, a child left at a church had to be taken care of by the church. Which in the 60s may have ended up in some institution, he would have been alive but still doomed.

I am not defending the moms deed at all, just pointing out that times were different back then. Care of special needs kids was not common, some tagged along with their families. I remember my grandparents stories of the "village idiots"... disabled people who were with their families but led horrible, tortured and taunted lives. In cities, sn children were usually institutionalized. Living dead.

And we just lack more info about the mom. She may have been severely depressed with no access to help (therapy was not widely accessible,mainly instititionalized and heavily drug/lobotomy based). That dramatically changed for the better in the 70s and 80s.
She may have had a new boyfriend who told her "to get rid" of the child (that sadly even happens today). She may have had to work to survive with nobody around willing to take care of her son. It looks like the father was not in the picture.

Again I am not defending a killer. But her motivation may have been sheer desperation.

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

There was no law about giving children up to public places like that in the 60s. There has since the beginning of time however been an unspoken policy of church asylum, a child left at a church had to be taken care of by the church. Which in the 60s may have ended up in some institution, he would have been alive but still doomed.

I am not defending the moms deed at all, just pointing out that times were different back then. Care of special needs kids was not common, some tagged along with their families. I remember my grandparents stories of the "village idiots"... disabled people who were with their families but led horrible, tortured and taunted lives. In cities, sn children were usually institutionalized. Living dead.

And we just lack more info about the mom. She may have been severely depressed with no access to help (therapy was not widely accessible,mainly instititionalized and heavily drug/lobotomy based). That dramatically changed for the better in the 70s and 80s.
She may have had a new boyfriend who told her "to get rid" of the child (that sadly even happens today). She may have had to work to survive with nobody around willing to take care of her son. It looks like the father was not in the picture.

Again I am not defending a killer. But her motivation may have been sheer desperation.

A mercy killing is something I have wondered myself. Maybe he started having health problems relating to his DS and she couldn't afford treatment. I also don't know about institutions being free either. I also wonder about her traveling and if she traveled alone or was with someone. I agree about your earlier statement where the way he was wrapped in the bundle and was fully clothed could indicate signs of care. In regards to the family stating she said, "we don't have to worry about him anymore" we don't really have context like she could have been sobbing while saying it to them. Back then people were encouraged to put there disabled children in an institution due to it being seen as what is best for them. Maybe family didn't question it because people were hassling her to do so?

 

[Dr. Nici Vance]

Please keep an eye out for the official press release through the Jackson County Sheriff's Office regarding little Stevie Crawford. It will have accurate information and should give a timeline regarding the investigative efforts that were put forth on this 57+ years-old case. We were honored to be a part of the team that resolved this with Parabon Nanolabs.
Dr. Nici, Oregon State Medical Examiner's Office

 

[Lilibet]

Please keep an eye out for the official press release through the Jackson County Sheriff's Office regarding little Stevie Crawford. It will have accurate information and should give a timeline regarding the investigative efforts that were put forth on this 57+ years-old case. We were honored to be a part of the team that resolved this with Parabon Nanolabs.
Dr. Nici, Oregon State Medical Examiner's Office

Thank you for helping! Here is what was posted on the Jackson County Sheriff website and FB page yesterday, June 28. I live in the area and I’m so glad Stevie has been identified at long last. Great work and perseverance by many over the years.

Oregon's Oldest Unidentified Person Case Solved

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[Iameven]

I am so glad to see this boy identified and given a name. It’s cases like this that give hope to others.

Also, let us not be too quick to make an assumption about what happened. We may never know the whole story. The mother went on a trip and returned without Stevie saying, according to relatives, that they wouldn’t have to worry about him anymore.

That does sound suspicious presented in that manner. However, maybe he was placed in the care of someone else that she thought would care for him or there was a natural death. We don’t know the nature of the trip nor if any missing person report was ever filed by the family.

Also, so happy to know that living relatives helped to confirm DNA and the diligence of follow up by the police.

 

[30Anne]

Not sorry to say, I don't understand this mindset.
Choose to leave him in a hospital waiting room, a church, a school, etc. and walk away.
That's so difficult, or what?

Professionally, I have several years working people going through de institution process who had lived in residential facilities from when they were babies and toddlers ( most were born in the 1960s ). Most babies with Down Syndrome went straight to residential care after being born due to then the treatable heart conditions and significant swallowing issues - let alone because of the stigma. I wonder why she took him home? Mostly state residential facilities were free at this time.

Over the years I worked in this role, several family members remembered being told that there disabled siblings were going away and their parents telling them that they did not have to worry about them any more ( the disabled children were put into residential facilities when they were slightly older and more children had been born).
I do agree where was Stevies' father? Also, I think it would taken 2 people to assemble the frame etc around Stevie and let's not forget the weights, he was not meant to float and been found and Stevie deserved better than that.

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

I do agree where was Stevies' father? Also, I think it would taken 2 people to assemble the frame etc around Stevie and let's not forget the weights, he was not meant to float and been found and Stevie deserved better than that.

I completely agree. The sheets and weights remind me of something closeby as in residential not stuff you'd think people would be traveling with unless moving. Maybe they purchased them from thrift second hand stores? Were they common in this time? I also agree that maybe his mother did leave him with someone.

 

[Dr. Nici Vance]

Here is a more thorough account of the collaborative efforts put forth to identify this little boy.
OREGON STATE POLICE MEDICAL EXAMINER'S OFFICE ASSISTS JACKSON COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE IN IDENTIFYING THE OLDEST UNIDENTIFIED HUMAN REMAINS CASE IN OREGON

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

Steven Alexander Crawford born October 2, 1960 in Las Cruces, New Mexico. ❤

 

[calico3]

I wonder if we will hear more in a follow up as to what caused Stevie's death. This is such a sad case. RIP Little Stevie.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

UO scientist aids in ID of child in the state's oldest cold case