Without A Trace
No one likes to think about it, but the truth is that thousands of people go missing annually. It's shocking how often people have gone missing without others realizing it. However, it's difficult not to notice when someone famous goes missing. Sometimes they are thankfully found alive while others have unfortunately met their end. There are also cases where they were never missing at all. But there are various cases where stars have disappeared without a trace.
Had their famous lifestyle become too overwhelming for them? Was there a case of misconduct? Had they changed their identity? There is much speculation, but the answers have been lost as time passes.
Theodasia Burr Alston
“Dear Theodosia” was a ballad sung as a duet by Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr in the Broadway hit Hamilton for their newborns. Later in the story, Hamilton's Philip Hamilton dies in battle, but not many realize that Theodosia Burr of Burr had a tragic ending to her story as well.
She was humiliated when Hamilton suggested that she and her father were involved in an incestuous relationship. What made it worse was that when she was helping her father pull back from the west and leave the country, he was put on trial for treason. She decided to find a boat at the Georgetown harbor after her son passed away in 1813, and she disappeared. Some believed she wished to marry a Native American, while others thought she had left with pirates. A more realistic answer would be that she had drowned.
Richey Edwards
Richey Edwards was the guitarist and lyric writer in the rock band called Manic Street Preachers. He aimed to be as genuine as possible, and one day in 1991, he cut the words "4 REAL" into his bicep in response to how authentic his gloomy character was.
It was 1995 when he disappeared but many believed he was putting on another performance. He was later presumed dead when the time had passed, and he still hadn't been found. His abandoned car had been found nearby a bridge well known for suicide jumps, but Richey's family insisted that he would never do that.
Harold Holt
It was in December 1967 when Harold Holt went missing. Witnesses had seen Australia's 17th prime minister swimming at a secluded beach when the tide was rough, so many believe he drowned.
Occam’s Razor never prevented outrageous conspiracies, so there was speculation that the CIA had assassinated him because he wanted Australia to pull away from Vietnam. In contrast, others believed he had been a Chinese spy who faked his death so that he could go back to China. Australia named a swimming facility after him to honor him.
Connie Converse
Although she is now recognized as the first singer-songwriter in history, Connie Converse struggled as a musician in the 1950s. She felt she had failed and left music behind in 1961 for a more peaceful life. It wasn't until 1974 that she packed her car and said goodbye to her friends, ready for a new beginning. At the time, she was still overcome with remorse, but she was never seen or heard from again.
There are no answers to her where she might have gone. She may have thrived in her new life, paved her way to the success she wanted, or feelings of failure may have overwhelmed her, so she gave up on life. Or perhaps she had lived life and passed away from natural causes.
Jim Sullivan
He had been so close to making his big break when acclaimed folk-rocker, Jim Sullivan, vanished. He had been in the music industry during the 1960s and 1970s and would have cultivated a bright future for himself had he been able to make the Nashville, Tennessee concert. The skilled man seemed to have all he needed to get there.
There had been no sign of him, but his car was found abandoned outside Santa Rose, New Mexico. All who knew him knew that he would never be without his guitar, but his guitar had been found in a local motel along with his other belongings. Many believed that he had intentionally disappeared.
Barbara Newhall Follett
It was the age of Jazz when 13-year-old Barbara Newhall Follett released a novel and was discovered to be a literary genius. It was said that she could have become America's next great author, but her father had gotten in the way. He had left her and her mother behind once he had found a younger woman. She started working as a typewriter when she was 16 but never wrote another novel again.
By 1939, she had been doing this for ten years before disappearing. Follet had gotten into an argument with her husband, who did very little to find her, choosing not to inform the authorities of her disappearance until 1966. No one knew if she had died or changed her identity. Perhaps she had eventually gone on to write novels under another name.
Fan BingBing
Fan Bingbing had acted in the famous X-Men movie Days of Future Past, and the actress soon became well known for that particular role. She was one of the rare few who had made a name for herself outside of China but soon vanished on the 1st of July, 2018. The Chinese government discovered that she had been evading taxes.
It wasn't the Chinese government's first encounter with this situation. Ai Weiwei was an artist who apologized in October via her social media platform for her three-month disappearance but still hasn't been seen since. There are still no answers about where she may be or what she's up to.
Rico Harris
Renowned 2000s Harlem Globetrotters' basketball player, Rico Harris, saw his success crumble due to his drinking. He had been intoxicated at his security job in LA and fired. He had hit an all-time low and decided to leave his mother's house for his girlfriend's in Seattle.
His car had been found filled with his belongings outside of Sacramento, and it was said that days afterward, a tall man had been spotted walking alongside the road. Along with this, they found human tracks thought to be his, but they never found him. It was thought that he may have caught a lift when there were no more reported sightings, but there are no more clues as to what happened to him.
Antoine De Saint-Exupery
Antoine de Saint-Exupery was the author of Le Petit Prince, one of the best-known children's novels worldwide. In addition to his writing capabilities, Antoine was a skilled flyer who enjoyed taking risks and pulling tricks. He had decided to enlist in the military to defend France during World War II in his adulthood. His flying style meant he put those tasked with completing missions with him at risk. He took many risks leading to multiple errors, but the most damaging occurred on the 31st of July in 1944.
It was only in the year 2000 when the remains of his plane were found. He had been taking off for a mission over the Mediterranean when he crashed, but his body was never found.
Jim Thompson
Thai silk became a precious resource thanks to Jim Thompson, a merchant. He relocated to Thailand and launched one of the most prosperous commercial endeavors in history, becoming a wealthy socialite by 1967. He was a former agent of the OSS. He left for a motorcycle journey in Malaysia in that particular year. He never came back.
Any number of things could have happened to him: He could have been taken out by other Bangkok businessmen, the Thai government, an Asian anti-CIA faction, or even by the actual CIA. He definitely didn’t just die in the wilderness, though, because he had survival training. Something fishy happened to him; it’s just that nobody is sure what. His huge home, pictured above, is now a museum in Thailand.
John Bingham, 17th Earl Of Lucan
In 1974, Lord Lucan (who was once considered for the role of James Bond) got fed up with battling his wife for custody of their three children and spying on them and recording their telephone conversations, and decided to bludgeon her to death in a darkened room simply. The problem with murdering in a darkened room, though, is that you can’t verify your target. So instead of killing his hated wife, he ended up killing his children’s dearly beloved nanny, Sandra Rivett. Whoops.
After the murder, he vanished and was never found. Some say he disappeared to Africa and died in the wilderness, some say he jumped into a river, and some say that his friends fed his remains to tigers at a private zoo. No matter how you slice it, this guy probably met the end he deserved.
Amelia Earhart
Everyone knows the famous story of Amelia Earhart, one of the greatest aviators of her time, who disappeared in 1937 in an attempt to fly around the world. The thing is, though, that that’s not the whole story. Her plane didn’t simply vanish, as everybody thought for years; naval ships received radio transmissions from her for days after her plane landed on a small, uninhabited island in the Pacific, too low on fuel to carry on.
Days after the transmissions stopped (after her plane was likely carried out to sea), the U.S. Navy sent planes to fly over the island. They didn’t see any planes or people, so they wrote off all the credible transmissions as hoaxes. They never sent anyone down onto the island to check for sure. It is now believed, due to a dig that turned up artifacts from the time, that she survived on the island for many months. A body was likely never found because the island is inhabited by coconut crabs, large creatures that have been known to eat whole animals and carry off their bones.
Glenn Miller
Famed musician Glenn Miller joined the Army during WWII, though he was well above the draft age. He became part of a band that went around doing performances to boost troop morale, which was common for the younger male artists of the day.
In December 1944, Miller was on his way to France for one such performance when his plane disappeared over the English Channel. For years, the leading theory was that he was accidentally bombed by Allied planes, but new evidence that recently turned up indicates that the fuel intake froze over, causing the plane’s engine to stop working, the plane plummeting into the water as a result.
Dorothy Arnold
The disappearance of Dorothy Arnold was the most-talked-about scandal in 1910 Manhattan. A wealthy socialite, the 25-year-old aspiring writer went out one day, telling her mother she was going to buy a new evening gown. She ran into a friend, whom she told that she was going for a walk in Central Park. That was the last anyone saw of her.
She had a lunch appointment with her mother that she never kept, and her family, not wanting the bad publicity, hired private investigators instead of notifying the police. By the time they did notify the police months later, the trail had gone cold. Some people suspect she committed suicide over a rejected manuscript or died of a botched abortion, but those who saw her that day said she was in excellent spirits, so that seems unlikely. Others suspected that her 40-something boyfriend, George C. Griscom Jr., murdered her, but he was in Italy at the time. Her disappearance remains one of the country’s great unsolved mysteries.
Bison Dele
NBA star Brian Williams was famously eccentric before leaving sports and changing his name to Bison Dele to become a sort of wealthy nomad, roaming Asian countries and going to Lebanese deserts to fire bazookas for fun.
In 2007, he bought a boat, named it Hakuna Matata, and said he was going to sail from Tahiti to Hawaii with a captain, his girlfriend, and his brother. Well, the boat never made it to Hawaii, and the only member of that party who was ever heard from again was Dele’s brother, Miles Dabord. Two months later, he was arrested in Phoenix for trying to buy gold with one of his brother’s checks. It’s pretty easy to connect the dots as to what happened, but the murders have never been confirmed since Dabord overdosed on insulin while he was released on bail.
Joe Pichler
Joe Pichler — featured actor in the Beethoven movies, Varsity Blues, and a few other pieces —would probably have had a great future in acting. He took a break after his childhood career in order to finish high school. He had just gotten his braces off and was planning to move back to LA to start acting again when he went missing.
It was 2006, and he had just finished an evening of playing cards with his friends. They all said he was in good spirits that night, but later, around 4 a.m., he called one of the friends, who said he was “inconsolable.” Pichler told his friend he would call back in an hour but never did. His car was later found at an intersection near a bridge, and a suicide note was found in his apartment saying he wished that he had been a “stronger brother” and willed all of his possessions to his younger brother. All signs pointed to a suicide jump, but no traces of his body were ever found. His family insisted that he would never commit suicide and that there must have been foul play.
Jean Spangler
Jean Spangler was a ’40s actress on the brink of becoming a star. One evening in 1949, she told her sister-in-law that she was going to meet her ex-husband and then to a film shoot that would last into the night. She never returned. Later, her purse was found in a park with the straps ripped. Inside, a note read: “Can’t wait any longer. Going to see Dr. Scott. It will work best this way while mother is away.”
The note was addressed to Kirk. Famous actor Kirk Douglas called the police specifically to say that it wasn’t him, but Spangler had been in his last film, and Kirk isn’t all that common a name. Plus, calling the police specifically to tell them they shouldn’t suspect you are, well, a little suspicious. A friend of Spangler’s would later say that she was on her way to having an abortion, which was illegal at the time and usually done unsafely. Nobody is quite sure whether she died in the process or something happened to her on the way there.
Sean Flynn
For years, Sean Flynn lived in the shadow of his golden-age Hollywood father, Errol Flynn. He tried acting for a time, but with little success, as most of his pictures turned out to be flops. He got his big break, however, not with a film but with the Vietnam War. He signed up to be a photojournalist and was sent to Vietnam, consistently sending back chilling photos of the war that helped spur the anti-war movement.
However, on April 6, 1970, that all ended. He and journalist Dana Stone went to take photographs at a Viet Cong checkpoint and were never seen or heard from again. Sadly, it’s not hard to imagine what happened to them.
Michael Rockefeller
Nelson Rockefeller was governor of New York and vice president under Gerald Ford, but it was his son who met with a suspicious demise. Michael Rockefeller was collecting artifacts in New Guinea when he vanished. His boat was found floating 12 miles from shore. Given the lack of evidence, his death has been officially ruled a drowning.
In 2014, Carl Hoffman published a book titled Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller’s Tragic Quest for Primitive Art, in which he claims to have gone deep into the culture of the land’s native tribes of Asmat, immersing himself in a warring culture that often performs ritualistic cannibalism. In this book, witnesses come forward and admit to killing and consuming Rockefeller, as rumors at the time repeatedly alleged had happened. However, given the lack of actual evidence, this case still remains officially “unsolved.”
Ylenia Maria Sole Carrisi
Ylenia Maria Sole Carrisi was the daughter of two famous Italian actors and was basically the Italian Vanna White, turning the letters on their version of Wheel of Fortune in the early ’90s. In 1994, while on a backpacking journey in Central America, Carrisi went missing near New Orleans.
A security guard, when questioned about the case, stated that he saw someone vaguely matching her description jump into the Mississippi River, shouting “I belong in the water,” before swimming around and eventually being forced under by the undertow of a barge. However, there is no way to confirm that this was her. Twenty years later, Carrisi’s mother and the detective she hired to work the case still believe that she is alive somewhere.
Daniel Lind Lagerlof
Daniel Lind Lagerlöf is a Swedish director, producer, and screenwriter. In October 2011, Lagerlöf was out scouting for his next film, Camilla Läckberg’s Fjällbackamorden – Strandriddaren. He was in the Tjurpannan nature reserve near the steep cliffs outside Tanumshede in Bohuslän.
It’s believed large waves crashed onto the shoreline where Lagerlöf was scouting and knocked him off his feet. Due to the slippery rocks all around, Lagerlöf was unlikely to regain his footing and was likely swept out to sea. There were no other witnesses around. He is presumed dead.
Scott Smith
Canadian band, Loverboy, was one of the biggest rock bands of the early ’80s with hard-charging hits like “Hot Girls in Love” and “Working for the Weekend,” which are still well-known and played around the world.
Scott Smith was a founding member, staying with the group all the way until his strange disappearance at sea on November 30, 2000.
"Sweet Jimmy" Robinson
Jimmy Robinson fought Muhammad Ali in Miami Beach on February 7, 1961. Reporters tried everything to find out what happened to one of the lucky men to step in the right with the great one, but their hunt was only met by a dead end.
In fact, he had no known data of birth, no known full name, no family, and no public records linking him to a single time or place. It was almost as if he had never existed.
Oscar Zeta Acosta
Portrayed by Benicio Del Toro in Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas, Oscar Zeta Acosta was a Mexican-American lawyer and activist.
He lived a crazy lifestyle as it was portrayed in the cult-classic film, but nevertheless, Acosta vanished in 1974 while traveling through Mexico when he was 39 years old.
Zahir Raihan
During the 1960s and early 1970s, Zahir Raihan was arguably the most prominent Bangladeshi writer, filmmaker, and political activist in the world. His best-known film is the 1971 short documentary film Stop Genocide which documented “the killings and atrocities carried out by the Pakistan Army on the people of the then East Pakistan.”
The following year, Raihan disappeared while searching for his brother Shahidullah Kaiser, who was captured and killed by the Pakistan army. It’s believed that Zahir Raihan was killed in a surprise attack by members of the Pakistani army.
Weldon Kees
Weldon Kees was considered by someone of the finest up-and-coming American poets in the early 1950s. However, he disappeared before he could achieve superstardom. In July of 1952, Kees’ car was found abandoned near the Golden Gate Bridge. While a body was never found, many assumed he jumped.
However, others contend that Kees fled to Mexico, citing the fact that his wallet, sleeping bag, and account savings book were also missing.
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce was one of America’s most successful short story writers in the latter half of the 1800s and early 1900s. The Civil War veteran’s book The Devil’s Dictionary was named one of “The 100 Greatest Masterpieces of American Literature.”
In 1914, the 71-year-old went on a tour of Civil War battlefields before disappearing somewhere in the American southwest. Many theorize he was caught up in the Mexican Revolution, while others claim he committed suicide near the Grand Canyon. However, no proof has been found of either.
Jimmy Hoffa
Union leader Jimmy Hoffa’s might be the most famous disappearance in American history. The longtime Teamsters head was very well-respected by his union members but was also heavily involved in organized crime. In 1975 Hoffa, who had just gotten out of prison, was planning to meet with two Detroit mobsters as part of his quest to reclaim leadership of the Teamsters.
Hoffa was waiting for two men in the parking lot of a restaurant the last time he was seen. For decades, Hoffa’s true fate has been hotly debated, with the most famous theory being that he was buried in the end zone of Giants Stadium.
Forrest Schab
Forrest Schab was a Canadian rapper known as DY. In August 2010, he disappeared while in Mexico, filming a music video for his song "That's My Spot."
Even though he was missing for three months, his family only reported him missing on November 18, 2010. There are still no leads or evidence to tell police what happened to him.
Thomas Hale Boggs Sr.
Thomas Hale Boss Sr. Represented New Orleans, LA, in the House Of Representatives. The politician was the leader of his party and had a campaign for Nick Begich when he suddenly disappeared.
In 1972, Boggs Sr. boarded a plane in Anchorage and was supposed to fly to Juneau. Everyone on board the plane, including Boggs, disappeared.
Art Scholl
Art Scholl was a stuntman who helped work on the Tom Cruise film Top Gun. At 4,000 feet, the pilot lost control of his plane while performing a scripted stunt. Five miles away from the coast of Encinitas, his plane hit the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
The coast guard made efforts to find the plane, but without any evidence of where it exactly sank, they declared him dead.
Licorice McKechnie
In 1986, McKechnie decided to go back to her hometown in Edinburgh to see her family. But after she left, she was never seen or heard from again.
Her sister said that she was in a clinic in Sacramento recovering from surgery in 1990. But McKechnie's last public sighting was hitchhiking in Arizona three years prior.
Hart Crane
Clarence Arthur Crane was Hart Crane's father. He was a successful chocolatier from Ohio. After his father died in 1932, Hart Crane went into a deep depression, according to his closest relatives and his friends.
The poet decided to move to Mexico to write poetry about Hernan Cortes. He went by ship and allegedly fell off the side. His body was never recovered.
Ian Mackintosh
On July 7, 1979, Barber boarded a plane. A few hours later, a distress signal was sent out as the plane reached Kodiak Island. The Coast Guard was dispatched to help them.
But by the time the Coast Guard reached their last known location, there wasn't any sign of them. The plane wasn't anywhere. There was no sign of a crash in the area or any debris. Everyone on the plane was presumed missing.
Pierre Bianconi
Pierre Bianconi was a successful football player. At the end of his career, he played for the Corsican national team. But since Corsican is an independent nation in France, it was not recognized by FIFA.
In December 1993, there were reports of the football star being seen in the port of Bastia. This was the last time he was ever seen, and his car was even found there.
Ylenia Carrisi
Ylenia Carrisi was an Italian actress who got her big break when she starred in "Champagne in Paradiso. She then went on to be on Italy's version of "wheel of Fortune" in 1989 at just 18 years old.
But five years later, the actress went missing. She was in New Orleans researching a novel and was never heard from again.
Zelim Bakaev
After Zelim Bakaev went missing, Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen president, denied anything to do with it. He even implied that he was killed by his own family because of his sexuality.
"Isn't there anyone in the village, any man in the family, who can admit: 'We did this? They know full well who it was." Zelim Bakaev's father told Radio Free Europe: "None of his relatives laid a finger on him. There was no reason to lay a finger on him."
John Brisker
John Brisker decided to start an export company in Africa. But a phone call with his girlfriend on April 11, 1978, was the last time he was heard from again.
To complicate things, the government couldn't even find evidence of him ever going to Africa. Either way, in 1985, he was declared dead solely so that his estate could be sold in an auction.
Slim Wintermute
Slim Wintermute worked for Boeing in Seattle. The man had three kids and a wife. The happily married 60-year-old decided to take a boat out on lake Washington. Apparently, he left the boat at some point and disappeared.
His son told officials that he had been taking medication for his heart. It's possible the man had a heart attack and fell overboard.
Patrick McDermott
Patrick McDermott worked on many short films in the 200s. Some of his most notable movies were "Rendezvous and "Felix the Christ" It's reported that he must have drowned in the Pacific Ocean.
But in 2017, new theories surfaced. Tabloids started stating that McDermott had been sighted in Sayulita, Mexico. No one has been able to confirm it for sure.
Roald Amundsen And Umberto Nobile
In June 1928, according to the BBC, Italian seaplane pilot Umberto Nobile crashed his aircraft, the Italia, while returning from the North Pole.
In 1928, The BBC said that Pilot Umberto Nobile crashed an Italian seaplane while flying back to the North Pole. The last location on the plane was just a few miles from Bear Island. They sent a message to their base at 6:45 p.m. on June 18. After that, no one on board was ever heard from again.
John Cabot
John Cabot was born in Italy in 1450 and was a famous navigator and explorer. He explored a large portion of Canada for the British between 1497 and 1498.
The Italian explorer helped uncover a lot of Canadian territory for the British and was recognized for his work. He was supposed to do a lot more but never returned from his 1498 expedition. He was presumed dead.
Eduard Vogel
Eduard Vogel was another explorer that wanted to find a trade route to Asia that didn't go past the Middle East. He split off from his original expedition by himself and disappeared just a year later.
In 1873, word of the Sultan of Wadia spread. He said that he had ordered the explorer's death even though no one knew why. In order to protect the privacy of those depicted, some names, locations, and identifying characteristics have been changed and are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblances to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.