Going West: True Crime - Evelyn Hartley // 344

Episode Date: September 29, 2023

In October of 1953, a 15-year-old girl went missing while babysitting in her Wisconsin neighborhood. A cursory search of the home revealed blood, making it obvious that she had been met with foul play. And it didn’t take long for her to be linked to one of the country’s most prolific serial killers. But was he actually involved, or was it another local? This is the story of Evelyn Hartley. BONUS EPISODES Apple Subscriptions: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/going-west-true-crime/id1448151398 Patreon: patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES 1. Charley Project: https://charleyproject.org/case/evelyn-grace-hartley 2. Thomas' Find A Grave: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/196827399/thomas-gordon-hartley 3. Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/8tpc5t/breaking_down_what_mightve_happened_to_evelyn/ 4. What Happened to Evelyn Hartley? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_esp5uXuK7o 5. Evelyn's Find A Grave: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/153817195/evelyn-grace-hartley 6. Stories of the Unsolved: https://storiesoftheunsolved.com/2021/03/09/the-disappearance-of-evelyn-hartley/ 7. Medium: https://medium.com/@bayar93/breaking-down-what-mightve-happened-to-evelyn-hartley-and-where-her-remains-could-ve-been-83535a1f01f5 8. The Winona Daily News: https://www.newspapers.com/image/518102834/?terms=janice%20rasmusen&match=1 9. Tapa Talk: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/porchlightusa/1953-hartley-evelyn-october-24-1953-t13990-s10.html 10. The La Crosse Tribune: https://www.newspapers.com/image/513685608/?clipping_id=128601574&fcfToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmcmVlLXZpZXctaWQiOjUxMzY4NTYwOCwiaWF0IjoxNjk1MDA3NzE3LCJleHAiOjE2OTUwOTQxMTd9.7K4xJ2vPaB5ikYVP0XkR60URDMGHpxPuyrkUIR-wtEc 11. The Lineup: https://the-line-up.com/evelyn-hartley 12. You might be from La Crosse if... Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/fromlax/posts/1433741616775789/ 13. La Crosse Public Library Archives: https://archives.lacrosselibrary.org/local-history/history-repeats/evelyn-hartley/ 14. Clyde Peterson's obituary: https://lacrossetribune.newspapers.com/article/61131341/tywee-peterson-obituary-9-23-1974/ 15. Websleuths: https://www.websleuths.com/forums/threads/wi-evelyn-hartley-15-la-crosse-24-oct-1953.9532/page-46 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host Tee. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody, thank you for tuning in. We are almost into October days away, and we have some very unique cases and episodes coming for you guys this month, because October just feels like the time for it. It is the spooky season. It's our favorite season, actually. Yeah, so we're gonna try to have a little fun with it

if we can, obviously, while remaining very respectful. But today, we have a 1950s case for you guys. It is a very mysterious and eerie story out of Wisconsin around Halloween time. Yeah, we have not done a babysitter murder for you guys in a long time, but that's what we have for you guys today. It is very eerie when you get into the actual detail. Absolutely, also, if you're looking for more episodes,

we just released a bonus episode on our Patreon and Apple Podcasts, or sorry, Apple subscriptions on Apple Podcasts, and that is the story of Brit Lapthorn. That's a crazy case about a backpacker from Australia that traveled to Croatia, and that case happened in 2008. That just came out. So if you want to check that out, in almost 100 other bonus episodes that are full length

and add free that we have not covered on Going West, head on over to patreon.com slash Going West podcast, or just open up your Apple Podcast app and hit subscribe. All right, guys, I don't think we have anything more for you. I think that was enough. I think that was enough. I think that was enough. Alright guys, this is episode 344 of Going West, so let's get into it. In October of 1953, a 15-year-old girl went missing while babysitting in her Wisconsin neighborhood.

A cursory search of the home revealed blood, making it obvious that she had been met with foul play, and it didn't take long for her to be linked to one of the country's most prolific serial killers. But was he actually involved or was it another local? This is the story of Evelyn Grace Hartley, better known as EV, among her family and friends, was born on November 21, 1937, to parents Ethel and Richard Hartley. One of four, Evelyn grew up alongside two brothers named Thomas and Richard Jr. and a sister named Carolyn. But sadly, when Evelyn was just nine years old, her brother Richard Jr. fell ill of polio.

So he was 18 years old. He had just graduated high school and immediately enlisted in the Navy, stationed in Bainbridge, Maryland amidst the Korean War. And then he died just a few months later on September 5, 1946. Three years after their tragic loss, the family relocated from Charleston, Illinois to La Crosse, Wisconsin, which is nestled along the Mississippi River just over the border of Minnesota.

The family settled into their new community and instantly became members of the first Presbyterian Church there. An Evelyn herself worked both for the nursery and the Church's youth program and also sang and played piano in the Church choir. But she had a very athletic side as well. She enjoyed playing tennis, golfing, skiing, swimming, and hiking. so she was extremely active and had so much fun with all the different activities. In 1953, Evelyn was a junior at Central High School, and although her passion was science, she was also a member of the drama club.

Peer's described her as attractive, wholesome, and intelligent, and her principal remembered, quote, she was popular because she did things in the right way. Quiet and dependable, she was a diligent student and maintained a straight-A average. One classmate described her as quiet and pretty, and another said, quote, as I remember, she was so much better than most of us. You could talk very easily with her, and she was very bright. You thought she would be someone in the future.

And her family claimed that she had been on a few dates throughout her young life, but she had never been in a steady relationship. On the evening of Saturday, October 24, 1953, Evelyn had agreed to babysit for a colleague of her father's, Vigo Rasmussen. Evelyn's father Richard was a Ph.D. and a biology professor at LaCrosse State College, where Vigo was a physics professor. So that evening there was this big football game that drew in the entire town, which Vigo wanted to attend that night. Reportedly the Rasmussen's regular babysitter

was also attending this football game, so Richard recommended his daughter to his work colleague, and that seems to kinda be how she got the job, but some sources do claim that Evelyn and the Rasmussen's babysitter were actually friends, and that she was the one who recommended Evelyn when she wanted to go to the game instead of caring for the Rasmussen's baby. Others have claimed that Evelyn had wanted to back out of babysitting

that night because she needed to stay in and study, but that her mom just kind of encouraged her to uphold her commitment. And the great thing about babysitting, and with this baby in particular, is once the baby goes down, you can kind of do whatever you want. Exactly, she she still had time to study here. But regardless how it happened Evelyn found herself at the Ras Musin's home on that fateful Saturday evening Vigo's wife Madeline and their oldest daughter seven-year-old Roslyn were headed to this game as well leaving their youngest daughter 20-month-old Janice with Evelyn now around 6 p.m. that evening Vigo picked Evelyn up from her family's home on Johnson Street

in Southeast LeCrosse and drove her to their home on Heshler Drive, which is just 5 minutes away. Roslyn remembers Evelyn arriving with a large bouquet of flowers for the family because that's just the thoughtful and kind person that she was. Between 6.30pm and 6.45 pm, Madeline and Vigo walked Evelyn through the instructions to care for Janice, who was about to go to bed for the evening. She was told to put Janice in her crib at 7 pm and then at 7.15 pm, Evelyn was asked to go back into her room and cover her with a comforter, which was hanging over the end of the crib. Now around 6.45 pm,

Madeline, Vigo, Roslyn, and a young neighbor friend of hers headed out for this game, leaving Evelyn and baby Janice alone. So Evelyn put the baby down for bed, waiting until she was asleep to go back in and put the blanket on her as instructed. And as she waited, she opened up the four or five textbooks that she had brought with her to study and finish up her homework.

Like I said, she has pretty much the rest of the night to do her homework, which was what worked out so well about this gig or what was supposed to. So around 7pm, Evelyn's mom Ethel recalls having this urge to check on her daughter, but knowing that she was busy, refrained from doing so. While babysitting Evelyn usually checked in periodically throughout the evening by calling home, and around 8.30 pm, Evelyn had claimed that she would call her parents, but she didn't call.

So, Richard called the Rasamusean home to get in touch with Evelyn, but no one answered. Shortly after 9 pm, so about 30 minutes later, he was starting to grow concerned. So Richard decided to just head over to the Rasmussen's in hopes of making sure that everything was okay with his daughter, and arriving around 9.30 pm, so just over 3 hours after Evelyn had arrived. He rang the doorbell, but again, no answer. When Richard peered through the window, he could see lights on and hear music coming from the radio, but saw no sign of his daughter, nor any movement in the home. He knocked on the doors and windows, shouting to get his daughter's attention, but still,

he saw no sign of her, but he could see her shoe discarded on the floor and her schoolbook still open in the living room. And he could also see her coat and her purse, so it seemed obvious that she would be inside, so it didn't make sense why she wasn't coming to the door, nor answering the phone. Something just seemed really off, even just from the outside of the house. So becoming more concerned about Evelyn's whereabouts, Richard circled the property finding all the doors and windows locked, until he came upon one window to the basement that was not only unlocked, but open.

The screen had been removed and was resting against the exterior of the home, and this window bordered a vacant lot and was conveniently situated near a step ladder, which the family had been using to repaint the house. When Richard climbed in, he spotted Evelyn's other shoe at the foot of the basement stairs, so that was another very obvious and abrupt red flag. When Richard reached the living room where Evelyn was apparently studying, he found signs of a struggle. Aside from her discarded shoe and books tossed aside, her glasses were shattered and dropped

on the floor, and the throw rugs had been moved. When he checked Janice's room, he found her sound asleep alone in her crib, with the comforter that Evelyn was planning to drape over her at 715, still hanging from the foot of her bed. So at this point, completely panic-stricken, Richard ran from the house to seek help from a neighbor. It was around 9.40pm that Richard knocked on the door of the Ras Musins across the street neighbor, whose name is Frank Linder, asking him to call the police.

A call which was placed at 9.49pm. Rosalind remembers returning home from the game with her parents and witnessing absolute chaos descend upon their house. She said, quote, low and behold, our whole house was surrounded by police cars. My mom almost fainted. She jumped out of the car and shouted, where's my baby? My baby? But the rasmusons were told, it's not the baby, it's Evelyn.

Roslyn along with Evelyn's six-year-old sister Carolyn were put to bed in an upstairs room while the heartlies in the Rasmussen spoke with the police. The scene was more grim than Richard could comprehend. Police found blood in multiple locations, both inside and outside of the house. Rosalind remembered, quote, "'As long as I live, I will never forget coming home to that horrific scene. Blood everywhere, police everywhere, and the feeling of total fear and loss." Not only was it a turning point for the town, but for us as well,

I was so scared, we were terrified. I was trying to make sense of it all. It was the first time that I'd ever seen adults cry. So 20 police officers along with the sheriff, multiple detectives, highway patrolmen, and members of the district attorney's office responded to the home to investigate. Signs of foul play riddled the scene, but none of them gave any indication of where Evelyn had gone. And based on that open window, police believed that someone, either an opportunistic passer-by

or someone who knew Evelyn would be there alone that night, took advantage of the accessible window and entered the home specifically to abduct and potentially assault Evelyn Hartley. And I gotta say that's so scary thinking about that. She is locked in the house. She is, you know, supposedly very safe. She's watching this baby. She's studying. And little does she know before it happens that somebody is creeping through the basement window and sneaking up the stairs to attack her. For some reason, the scene or the picture that I have in my head is a scene from Black Christmas where the lead, I hear ya.

You know what I'm talking about, where the lead is down in the basement and you can see like a person walking past the basement window. Yes. Very, very scary. Well, and also with that, the fact that her shoe was found at the bottom of the basement stairs, like it makes you wonder if anything happened in the basement. And I guess I'm just saying that because basements are so scary that it makes this whole scene all the more

horrifying, knowing that part of it, part of the attack must have taken place there. But yeah, just a terrifying situation. And it's only going to get worse. So three other windows in the basement had marks from someone trying to pry open the panes, meaning that this person not only got through one of the windows but had tried to open others to get in. So footprints from a men's size 11 sneaker were found in both the living room of the home and the dirt and the window well of the open basement window.

And blood was found splattered both inside the house and also in the yard. A large puddle of blood had pooled on the floor beneath the basement window, leading investigators to believe that Evelyn had been injured and potentially fatally injured inside the house before being removed by her attacker or attackers and again through the basement. In the backyard, there were two more large blood stains, one about 18 inches wide, and then investigators also discovered a bloody handprint on the garage. Farther away from the Ras Musins home in the yard of their neighbors, the Downer family, there was another large blood stain.

So it appeared as if her abductor had been dropping Evelyn's bloodied body on the way out of the basement, leaving imprints along their route. Yeah, because you have to imagine this person is trying to haul a body out of a basement window. So yeah, that's going to be hard to do. So freaky. So fragments of her red corduroy pants were recovered nearby as well. And send dogs were put to work right away. And they were actually able to track Evelyn sent to a nearby intersection. And that was the street just north of the Ras Musin's home, which is Cooley Street.

But it was there, unfortunately, that they lost her scent, which led investigators as well as Evelyn's family to believe that she was put into a car and transported elsewhere. By early Sunday morning, when light dawned on the gruesome scene, Richard claims he knew his daughter was gone. The following day, Ethel walked through the crime scene herself and came to the same conclusion. She told the local paper quietly, quote, we know she isn't alive now.

The grim and tragic end to one of the community's most promising young members really weighed heavily on everyone in La Crosse. One of the Hartley's neighbors said, quote, you expect this to happen in New York or Chicago or St. Louis, not in La Crosse. The city of about 50,000 people really rallied behind her family and were determined to find who had taken Evelyn. And donations also poured in from just very concerned citizens and businesses all over

Wisconsin. With very few leads and very puzzling evidence here, please beg anyone who believed that they had seen or heard something to come forward. And this led to a tip from a neighbor of the Ras Musins, who said that they heard screaming coming from the house at 7pm on the evening of Saturday, October 24th, which would have been less than an hour after she arrived. Now thinking that it was just children playing, they neglected to report it or investigate it further. And because of the narrow window of time between when Madeline, Vigo and the children left,

which was around 6.45 pm, and when Evelyn was supposed to cover up the baby with her blanket, which was at 7.15 pm, police believed that she was abducted at 7 pm, which is so crazy to think about because they had left 15 minutes earlier. It's a tiny window. And that makes you believe that somebody had been watching the home,

maybe waiting for the adults to leave so that they could finally enter in through that basement window. Oh God, you're so right. Freaky. So, and this would also align with when neighbors heard screaming, of course. So, another neighbor claimed that he spotted two men walking with a girl in between them, stumbling slightly. And this was in the vicinity of the Ras Musin's house around 715 pm, which would definitely

make sense for the timeline here. Now later, when he was in his vehicle, this neighbor, he claimed that he spotted this trio again. But this time, the men were seated upright with one of them driving the car, and the girl was apparently slumped over next to the other man in the back seat. This tip became a crucial piece of evidence in the investigation, and it's still being discussed today as a possible theory. Now let's talk about the car for a second, so the car was light green in color and had two tone panels on its sides. This neighbor believed that it was either a 1941 or a 1942 Buick, and claims that he

saw it circling the neighborhood around 8 p.m. and that it was driving so quickly that he almost collided with it. And remember this case takes place in 1953, so you know, the car is around 10 years old. Now the car was apparently headed west, which would lead them across the Mississippi River and into Minnesota. The neighbor who reported this tip has now been identified as Ed Hofer, though he went unnamed to the media for like 50 years, and I'm assuming it's probably because he wanted to keep his identity safe from loads of speculation. Eugene Downer, who's the owner of the home neighboring the Rasmusons, where bloodstains

were also found, claimed that his wife also saw this suspicious green vehicle as well. Evelyn's disappearance was the most thorough search in the history of LaCrosse, and one of the most intense in Wisconsin's history, because over a thousand people gathered to search for Evelyn, alongside the police and the heartlies, just walking the neighborhood and calming the landscape for any sign of her. And a thousand people is quite a bit of people, you know, when the population's only 50,000 in the entire town. Oh, yeah, that's huge. And volunteers also just transcended age and background. It was like all types of people were coming out. The entire community just wanted to find answers for the family

and also just catch whoever did this and make sure that they're not going to do it to anybody else and pray on any other young women in the neighborhood. And also, a local brewing company and the local power company even chartered planes to search the area. And aerial searches encompassing a 50 mile or 80 kilometer radius work conducted just looking for any sign of her. So they were really putting in the work. and the National Guard also came to assist as well as students from LaCrosse State College where Richard and Vigo were professors and peers of Evolence from Central High School.

Boats sailed up and down the banks of the Mississippi in case she had been discarded there, and farmers were asked to walk the perimeters of their properties and keep an eye out for the rest of the Mississippi in case she had been discarded there, and farmers were asked to walk the perimeters of their properties and keep an eye out for any articles of clothing that may have been discarded, or maybe even like disturbed dirt that may be concealing a fresh grave. Radio and newspaper updates were frequent as the whole city was gripped by the appalling crime. By the end of the day on Sunday, a few articles were recovered and turned in by hikers, and that included a knife, still in its

sheath, a woman's slipper, a hankerchief, and a flashlight. However, none of these were confirmed to be linked to Evelyn nor her captors. Then, on October 30, 1953, so six days after her disappearance, searchers came across even more potential evidence. But this time, it seemed plausible that it could be linked to Evelyn's disappearance. At Public Mobile, we do things differently. From our subscription phone plans to throwing a big sale right now when no one else is. Well, maybe they are, but who cares? Our sale is better. things differently. or anyone who could use some savings right now. Subscribe today at publicmobile.ca. Different is calling. Pfff.

Before that quick break, Daphne was telling us that some of the searchers had found some items, but police did not think that they were linked to Evelyn's disappearance, but then they had found a few things that they were sure were linked to Evelyn. So near an underpass on Highway 14, which ran through town, as well as southwest down to Illinois and west towards Minnesota. Searchers recovered a pair of underwear and a bra that may have belonged to Evelyn. They were both stained with blood, though testing limitations at the time did not allow them to confirm whether or not it was actually Evelyn's blood. Then about four miles or six kilometers down the same highway, a pair of men's pants were

found, also blood stained. But the most clear piece of potential evidence came in the form of shoes that investigators believed that the perpetrator was wearing that night. Similar to the footprints left in the Ras Musin's home, and in the dirt of their window well in the basement window, the shoes were size 11 and had what police described as a suction cup pattern, matching the footprints left behind at the scene. The shoes were also recovered along Highway 14, outside of a small town called Koon Valley about half an hour southeast of La Crosse.

And like all the other items, the shoes were splattered with blood. Which is not something you come across often anyway as an article of clothing splattered in blood, so I feel like all of these are a pretty good bet, but like you said particularly these shoes. Absolutely. And the sneakers were BF Goodrich brand, with a rubber sole by the Hood Rubber Company, which had been bought out by BF Goodrich, and the model was called the Mogul, which was designed as active wear and specifically marketed as gym and athletic shoes. They also kind of resemble like high-top converse sneakers of today.

So from what police could ascertain by examining these shoes, they believed that the wearer operated heavy machinery and drove a motorcycle. A specific pattern of wear on the shoes resembled pedals of a wizard-brand motorbike. And inside the shoe, they were covered a single human hair, which they believed belonged to a person of African-American descent. Now based on the condition of the shoes, police also surmised that the shoes had been worn by two different men, and that one of the men's feet were too large for them. And I wonder how they kind of determined that maybe because the toe area was popping

up or something. Police announced, quote, we know definitely that the shoes were placed there a short time before they were found. We consider them to be the most important piece of evidence that we have. In the vicinity of the sneakers, investigators also recovered a worn denim jacket, which like every other item, sported blood stains. In this jacket was fashioned with metal buttons, one of which was missing. In addition to the blood, paint flecked on the back of the jacket.

The bottom few inches had been cut off and re-hemmed with white thread, and beneath the armpits was abnormal deterioration of the fabric, leading police to believe that the wearer possibly worked in a job that might require him to sport a safety harness, such as a construction worker. And due to smears in the pools of blood back of the Ras Musin House, police believe that Evelyn's kidnapper was wearing this jacket at the time of her abduction and likely murder. However, when comparing the shoes with the jacket, the jacket appeared disproportionately smaller than the shoes, which led police to the conclusion that there jacket, the jacket appeared disproportionately smaller than the shoes,

which led police to the conclusion that there were, as witnesses alleged, to kidnappers. Police presented the jacket and shoes to dozens of communities in the area, but could not determine their owners. Investigators even canvas some grave yards and dug up a few of the fresher graves just to rule out the possibility that Evelyn had been concealed in the soft dirt of a new burial. So running out of avenues to pursue, LaCrosse Police implemented some new tactics in their desperate attempt to find Evelyn. Police set up a vehicle inspection program for locals to drive through and have their

car checked out by law enforcement. And when no traces of blood were found, they were given a sticker to be displayed on their bumper that read, My Car Is OK. Authorities also instructed gas station attendants to be on the lookout for vehicles that appeared to be suspicious, as well as cars without an okay sticker, and to report the license plate of any driver who refused the search. And this is such a wild thing to do. I mean, it's amazing.

They are really putting in effort and trying, but still, just months continue to pass, and none of their great efforts were bringing any answers. So in May of 1954, eight months after Evelyn's disappearance, police announced mandatory lie detector testing. They mostly focused on male high school students, assuming that her captors had been young men, and that one of their peers would know them them or at least know of them. Law enforcement sought to test around 2,000 students, but quit after about 300 due to the controversy of the teens being forced to participate.

But still, the police kept an estimated that they questioned about 3500 people in regards to Evelyn's disappearance. But the sad thing here is that, as police feared, with no tangible leads, Evelyn's case had turned cold. Years passed without news on the matter, but then, in 1957, the case received renewed attention when the arrest of a depraved serial killer brought forth a surprising connection to LaCrosse, and some of you guys probably know who this person is. When the owner of a hardware store vanished, leaving blood stains on the floor, local police traced her whereabouts back to her most recent customer, whose name was Ed Geen.

Born in 1906 in LaCrosse, Wisconsin, Ed was living about two hours away in Plainfield at the time of the murder. His victim, Bernice Warden, disappeared on November 16th, 1957, and when investigators came by Ed's house, suspecting his involvement, they found Bernice's headless body strung up

in his shed like a hunting trophy. And they were able to trace another area disappearance back to him as well. That of a local bar owner named Mary Hogan, who he killed in 1954. But the most horrifying discovery of all, aside from the two women that he was found to have murdered, were the body parts of nearly a dozen other corpses used as decorations around his home. Human skin stretched and treated like leather, adorned chairs, lampshades, a waste basket, and clothing. Skulls donned his bedposts functioned as bulls in his kitchen.

Many other body parts were being saved or squirreled away for later, including his second victims entire head. Though there were only two confirmed victims, aside from the graves that he had desecrated, law enforcement believed that he could be responsible for as many as seven more. Now the connection to Evelyn was pretty theoretical, but entirely possible. Ed also hailed from lacrosse Wisconsin, and on the night that Evelyn vanished, he was believed to have been visiting relatives in that area. However, this was kind of a long shot because his two victims were women in their 50s, both of whom he shot and killed

pretty quickly. Neither Evelyn's profile nor the details of her abduction really aligned with Ed's MO. Although law enforcement did search his property for her remains, they came up empty-handed, and two lie detector tests came out in Ed's favor. But crazy that they questioned him about her and made him aware of her case at all, and just that this was a thought,

but yeah, it doesn't seem to connect at all. And for those of you who don't know, Ed Geens case was actually the inspiration for Texas chainsaw massacre. So that's how that... And so many other movies and shows like yeah, I mean He did some Seriously disturbing things that you really don't see in many other cases at all like he took he took things to a like

Hellish degree and that's why a lot of movies were kind of based on his case exactly But you know given all of this please ultimately decided that the connection was unlikely, and they ruled him out as a suspect. So Ed was eventually legally declared insane, and he died in a psychiatric hospital in 1984. Good riddance. Yes. Much later, in 2004, so 51 years after Evelyn's death, an unexpectedly promising lead came from a

surprising source, a recorded conversation from decades prior that had gone unnoticed on a tape recorder. This part is absolutely insane to me. It's so crazy, so basically a man named Mel Williams stumbled upon this eerie confession when he was revisiting a tape from a recording that he made at a Wisconsin bar in 1969. So 16 years after Evelyn disappeared. The story about why Mel was recording kind of differs depending on the source. Like one source says he was recording a band who was playing there that evening. And then another claims that he was recording a band who was playing there that evening,

and then another claims that he was just simply enthralled by the story that the men were telling, and he wanted to hear more. And that kind of seems to be more of Mel's recollection, and he later said, quote, this man was quite a character, buying booze for a bunch of alcoholic friends. I wanted him on tape for the memory.

But regardless of the reason, Mel spent that evening in a bar called the Raven in LaFarge, Wisconsin, which is about an hour southeast of LaCrosse. Mel overheard these two men discussing their involvement, along with another of their friends, in the abduction and murder of Evelyn Hartley. So one of the two men in the recording has remained officially unnamed, but locals have many theories about who he is. Whereas the other man who can be heard on the recording is Clyde Peterson, who is 22 at the time of Evelyn's disappearance.

The men also implicate a third man Jack Golter, who is 24 at the time. So after discovering this eerie conversation that he happened to capture on tape, Mel came forward and brought the tape into investigators, which obviously caused a giant stir in the community and confirmed many long-time rumors in the LaFarge area about who had been involved. Mel said in an interview quote, ''Anybody can make up a story, but there's gotta be something to this. Why would the story come to this town? Why does everybody in LaFarge have a story about this? I do know they were capable of it." So according to these men, they transported Evelyn by car from the Ras Musin's house in La Crosse to a home in La Farge, Wisconsin. Jack was apparently the person who officially ended Evelyn's life, and the men then buried

her just south of La Farge. Mel remembers one of the men asking him to shut off the tape, and he obviously forgot about it, writing off the story as nothing more than that of a colorful local. He didn't think twice about it until he stumbled upon it again 35 years later. So it's possible that the three men knew of Evelyn prior to her kidnapping and targeted her specifically. High school students in La Crosse were known to head down to La Farde to go to parties, and the three adult men believed to be involved in her disappearance hung around these teenage

parties. But sadly, all three of the men suspected of involvement in Evelyn's murder are now deceased. Clyde Peterson died of suspicious circumstances in 1974 and was discovered in an alley in LaFarge. His death was thought to be a heart attack but nobody actually knows. Now Jack Galtaire took his own life on Christmas Day in 1967, two years before Mel recorded the conversation at the bar and possibly because he had some guilt. Definitely, that would make sense, and just for anybody that's confused about that, Jack

was not one of the ones at the bar, they were just talking about him, so that means that he was dead when that story was told and recorded. And when I said that he was probably racked with guilt, actually his friend, Clyde Peterson believed this as well. Clyde and Jack even had a history with crimes of this nature, having kidnapped a 15-year-old girl just two years before Evelyn's disappearance. So where is Evelyn Hartley? According to the men's story, she was buried along the Kikapoo River, which has flooded

many times since then, so it's likely that her remains, if they were there, have probably since been washed away. I think it always feels credible when... I mean, we really see this in a lot of cases where somebody will be bragging about their crimes. And a lot of times, weirdly, it happens in bars. Like, there are so many different stories popping up in my head where somebody has been bragging about what they did in a bar to somebody. I don't know if it's just like they're drunk and they're just reminiscing on the horrible shit they've done.

I think that's probably the case. You know, you get a little bit of liquid courage, man. You think you're a tough guy because you're drunk and then you start just kind of word vomiting out your crime. But it's just so dumb. Like what an irresponsible thing to do. I mean, luckily they do it because a lot of times this is what solves cases is when people

just can't shut up about it, you know? Absolutely. And I would say probably like 50% of the time, the person who's, you know, bragging about killing someone is actually the killer. But sometimes unfortunately, there's just people with big mouths and they just they want to look cool around their friends and they say stupid shit so you know I do I do think it's interesting though like police already had suspected that it was

a young man or young men who did this as they were you know they're in the area they could have committed other crimes they could have met Evelyn at some point. So even though there isn't some concrete major connection that we know of, like it's not like, oh, we know that Evelyn knew these guys, you know, it's not, there's nothing like that. Right. But still, it's pretty weird.

And it just really makes you wonder. So though the Heartleys bore the brunt of the pain from the tragic loss, the Ras Musin family also suffered. Shortly after Evelyn's disappearance, Vigo moved his family out of their home on a Hessler Drive, which he had built from the ground up actually, into a new house in a different part of town. He installed bars on the windows and became intensely protective over his wife and daughters. Roslyn, his daughter, remembered quote,

My dad almost had a total nervous breakdown. It almost drove him over the edge. It was a very hard and scary time. Janice herself didn't even know about the violin abduction that she survived until she read about it in her local paper when she was older. As the girls grew into teenagers, Vigo forbade them from babysitting. She said it affected him for the rest of his life, recalling quote, he was really hard on me, but I know a lot of it was because he was nervous and fearful. I felt really kind of lost in it all and really kind of overlooked.

I don't recall ever getting any kind of help. I was at a very impressionable age. Madeline Rasmussen passed away in 1990 and Vigo followed in 1997. Roslyn said sadly, quote, it haunted them for the rest of their lives. But she says she is forever grateful to Evelyn for her sacrifice, saying quote, I kind of feel like now Evelyn is kind of an angel. What a martyr she was. She gave up her life to protect my baby sister. After years of staying in La Crosse wondering what happened to their daughter, Evelyn's parents relocated to Oregon. They said later that they no longer cared to read speculation

about her murder. Evelyn's father Richard passed away in 1986, and her mother Ethel died in 2002, which means she passed just two years before that tape surfaced. Her brother Thomas was a celebrated botanist and worked all over the world, including Stins at Harvard and in Papua New Guinea and the South Pacific. After receiving a job offer in Australia, Thomas relocated to Canberra, where he lived until his death. Evelyn's last remaining sibling, Carolyn, lives in Oregon now.

And if Evelyn were alive today, she would be turning 85 years old this October. Evelyn heartily was 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighed about 125 pounds at the time of her disappearance. On the evening of her abduction, she was wearing a white blouse with pearl buttons, red corduroy jeans, and white bobby socks. And then obviously as you guys know, her shoes were recovered at the scene. She had brown hair and blue eyes. If you have any information about the disappearance of Evelyn Hartley, please call the lacrosse crime stoppers at 608-784-8477.

Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Tuesday we'll have an all-new case for you guys to dive into. I just can't believe that with all the work and manpower that was poured into the search for Evelyn that day, just found those few articles of clothing which obviously were important, it felt like those were connected to the case, but that didn't really get them anywhere anyway, like it's just crazy to me that this case is still such a mystery after all this time and work.

Yeah, and I just really hope that there's some sort of evidence that's still being preserved, so that maybe one day genealogy testing can actually prove who was responsible for taking Evelyn's life. Absolutely so we will wait and see. Thank you guys so much for tuning into this episode and we'll see you next week. Yeah we will see you on Tuesday. Tuesday. All right guys so for everybody out there in the world don't be a stranger. Thank you. you