Latest / The Path Went Chilly / Patreon Summer Sampler: George Owens

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Patreon Summer Sampler: George Owens · The Path Went Chilly

0:28
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Pathway Chili for this month's bonus
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Speaker 1: Patreon minisode I'm Robin, I'm Jules.
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Speaker 2: And I'm Ashley. Let's dive into this month's case.
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Speaker 3: July twenty second, nineteen eighty five, Nolansville, Tennessee. After failing
0:45
Speaker 3: to pick up his wife from the bus station, seventy
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Speaker 3: nine year old George Owens and his car are discovered
0:51
Speaker 3: to be missing from his home. One week later, George's
0:54
Speaker 3: abandoned vehicle is found on a hilltop in a rural
0:57
Speaker 3: wooded area over one hundred miles away, and piles of
1:01
Speaker 3: kindling are found outside and in the back seat. Eyewitnesses
1:05
Speaker 3: report having seen George in the area looking disoriented, leading
1:09
Speaker 3: to speculation that he wandered off into the woods, but
1:12
Speaker 3: a search effort fails to turn up any trace of him.
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Speaker 1: After that, the path went Chile. So this month we're
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Speaker 1: going to be exploring an unsolved missing person's case involving
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Speaker 1: an elderly victim, the nineteen eighty five disappearance of George Owens.
1:27
Speaker 1: If you're an unsolved mysteries fan, you're probably familiar with
1:30
Speaker 1: this story, which is often ranked as one of the
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Speaker 1: saddest most heartbreaking segments ever featured on the show. George
1:36
Speaker 1: was a very well liked and well respected minister from
1:39
Speaker 1: a small town in Tennessee, who lived an ordinary life
1:42
Speaker 1: with his wife, Aileen, and seemed to be an unlikely
1:44
Speaker 1: candidate to find himself at the center of an unsolved mystery.
1:48
Speaker 1: But everything changed when Aleen left town to visit a
1:51
Speaker 1: family member and George failed to pick her up a
1:53
Speaker 1: schedule from the bus station. Everyone became completely perplexed when
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Speaker 1: George's abandoned car was found on a rural hill top
2:00
Speaker 1: over one hundred miles away, as George had no known
2:03
Speaker 1: connection to the area. However, based on reports from a
2:06
Speaker 1: number of eyewitnesses who were called seeing George, it became
2:09
Speaker 1: apparent that he may have suffered some sort of medical
2:12
Speaker 1: issue and become disoriented, which is why you wound up
2:15
Speaker 1: so far from home. But if that's the case, what
2:18
Speaker 1: actually happened to George. Did he abandon his car and
2:21
Speaker 1: dive exposure after walking into the woods, or did he
2:24
Speaker 1: cross paths with the wrong person and become the victim
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Speaker 1: of foul play? Frustratingly, even though the case is still
2:30
Speaker 1: unsolved to this day, the unsolved mystery segment is currently
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Speaker 1: not available for viewing on their own film Rise channel
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Speaker 1: on Amazon Prime or YouTube. So I thought that would
2:39
Speaker 1: be an ideal time to revisit it. On the path
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Speaker 1: went Chile.
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Speaker 2: Okay, I can tell this is already going to be
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Speaker 2: a heartbreaking case because poor George, he's seventy nine years
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Speaker 2: old and he's going to pick up his wife and
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Speaker 2: he never shows up. Then we find his car in
2:54
Speaker 2: a very unusual place. It's far away, he doesn't have
2:58
Speaker 2: a connection there, and so everyone starts wonder what happened?
3:01
Speaker 2: Did he meet foul play? Did something happen to him?
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Speaker 2: Like you said, medically, you know, it's seventy nine. Common
3:08
Speaker 2: things that don't really have a profound physical effect on
3:12
Speaker 2: people our age or young young ends can have really
3:18
Speaker 2: really critical mental health effects on elderly people. For example,
3:21
Speaker 2: something as easy as like a UTI. My dad recently
3:25
Speaker 2: was experiencing one of those after a surgery, or many
3:28
Speaker 2: of those after his surgery, and it literally made him hallucinate.
3:32
Speaker 2: He couldn't he couldn't really tell where he was, and
3:35
Speaker 2: the doctor said, oh yeah. And elderly people when they
3:38
Speaker 2: get a urinary track infection, it has significant cognitive issues.
3:43
Speaker 1: With it.
3:43
Speaker 2: So it's possible that something like that happened to George,
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Speaker 2: where no one saw signs of any kind of mental
3:49
Speaker 2: distress or any kind of physical distress, and then within days,
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Speaker 2: maybe George suffered something that took him out of his element.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the thing, because in this case, him suffering
4:01
Speaker 1: from some sort of medical issue which caused him to
4:03
Speaker 1: become disoriented and go to a strange place. It's pretty
4:05
Speaker 1: plausible from what I've heard. No one saw any warning signs.
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Speaker 1: There didn't seem to be any medical issues with them
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Speaker 1: prior to when he went missing. So if that's what happened,
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Speaker 1: then it obviously overcame him very quickly.
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Speaker 3: So our story begins in nineteen eighty five and Nolansville, Tennessee,
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Speaker 3: a small town of around fifteen hundred people located just
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Speaker 3: over twenty miles southeast of Nashville. Our central figure is
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Speaker 3: seventy nine year old African American man named George Owens,
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Speaker 3: who lives with his seventy seven year old wife, Eline Owens.
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Speaker 3: The couple were high school sweethearts and have been married
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Speaker 3: for sixty years. After retiring from his job as a
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Speaker 3: custodian during the nineteen sixties, George became the associate minister
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Speaker 3: at Nashville's New Hope Baptist Church. He's considered to be
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Speaker 3: a very well liked and respected citizen within the community
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Speaker 3: who never misses his Sunday services. On the morning of Monday,
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Speaker 3: July twentie second, George was scheduled to drive from Nolan
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Speaker 3: Hille to Nashville in order to pick up a Lien
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Speaker 3: at the bus station as she was returning from a
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Speaker 3: trip to Ohio to visit her niece. Aleen's overnight bus
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Speaker 3: ride arrived at six thirty am, but to her surprise,
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Speaker 3: George was not there to meet her, and he never
5:16
Speaker 3: showed up. The couple had spoken on the phone at
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Speaker 3: around three pm the previous afternoon, where George joked quote, well,
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Speaker 3: I'll meet you if I don't oversleep. Indeed, Eileen hoped
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Speaker 3: that George had simply overslept, but after waiting for an hour,
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Speaker 3: she finally decided to call George's brother, Alfred and asked
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Speaker 3: him to come pick her up. Alfred attempted to call
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Speaker 3: George but received no answer, so we went to meet
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Speaker 3: Alean at the bus station and drove her home. When
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Speaker 3: they discovered that both George and his green nineteen seventy
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Speaker 3: two Dodge Start were missing.
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Speaker 1: Two place settings with a couple Sunday dinnerware were on
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Speaker 1: the dining room table, and the only clothing which appeared
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Speaker 1: to be missing was one of George's black suits. One
5:58
Speaker 1: month earlier, Alien had given George a black hat for
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Speaker 1: his birthday, and even though George had worn it every
6:03
Speaker 1: single day since then, it was left behind. The couple's
6:07
Speaker 1: dog was also wandering around the house and appeared to
6:10
Speaker 1: have not been recently fed. Alfred became concerned enough that
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Speaker 1: he immediately contacted the police and reported George missing. Neighbors
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Speaker 1: would say that they last saw George leaving the house
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Speaker 1: on the afternoon of July to twenty first, driving his
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Speaker 1: Dodge Dart on Nolansville Road towards Nashville, which they found
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Speaker 1: unusual since George was not scheduled to pick up a
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Speaker 1: lean until the following morning.
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Speaker 2: So it is possible that George was confused on the date,
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Speaker 2: and that would signify that he was having some kind
6:37
Speaker 2: of mintal distress or some kind of cognitive issue that
6:40
Speaker 2: was going on. It's also really odd that it sounds
6:44
Speaker 2: like the dog would have been taken care of in
6:45
Speaker 2: a different manner, maybe put in a in a crate,
6:48
Speaker 2: maybe in a little room, maybe would have been you know,
6:50
Speaker 2: just had more food and water put out, and in
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Speaker 2: this little hat that's kind of his safety blanket now
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Speaker 2: that his wife gave him. It's kind of his love
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Speaker 2: letter from her. He leaves it and he's been wearing
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Speaker 2: it every single day. So he's changing a lot of
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Speaker 2: his just normal routine behaviors and God bless him. They
7:06
Speaker 2: even had the Sunday dinnerware set on the dining room
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Speaker 2: table waiting basically waiting for her to come home, and
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Speaker 2: he was going to spend the evening with her and
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Speaker 2: it never happens.
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Speaker 1: Well, it strikes me is that he set two places
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Speaker 1: with the Sunday dinnerware even though Aileen was not scheduled
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Speaker 1: to come home until Monday morning. So I take that
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Speaker 1: as a sign that he may become confused and thought
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Speaker 1: that Aileen, he was supposed to pick her up on
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Speaker 1: Sunday and then we'd be back home in time for dinner.
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Speaker 1: And for all we know, maybe he showed up to
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Speaker 1: the bus station and when she didn't show up, he
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Speaker 1: was just left completely confused.
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Speaker 2: And at that time. We didn't have cell phones or
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Speaker 2: anything like that where he could be calling and keeping
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Speaker 2: in touch with her. This is a seventy nine year
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Speaker 2: old man who's picking up his seventy seven year old wife.
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Speaker 2: I definitely think it feels like something was off and
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Speaker 2: he was confused, and then, like you said, when plans
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Speaker 2: aren't working out the way, he thought that could also
7:55
Speaker 2: lead to further distress and kind of fear, because that's
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Speaker 2: what happens when you don't remember where you are or
8:01
Speaker 2: what day it is, or those kinds of things that
8:02
Speaker 2: leads to a sense of fear and panic.
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Speaker 3: My grandmother had to mention dementia in the last years
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Speaker 3: of her life, and before she was moved into like
8:13
Speaker 3: a home, like a residence where they would care for them,
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Speaker 3: she was in this really huge house all by herself
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Speaker 3: on this property, and she would go to church on
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Speaker 3: like a day at like five point thirty in the
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Speaker 3: morning when there was no church service, and she would
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Speaker 3: show up somewhere completely different and she'd be like knocking
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Speaker 3: on somebody's house, being like I'm here for church, and
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Speaker 3: it would be like five am in the morning. So
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Speaker 3: it is incredibly scary when somebody gets to that point.
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Speaker 3: I mean not to say that he had dementia, but
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Speaker 3: there could be any number of cognitive issues that could
8:45
Speaker 3: cause him to be very disoriented or confused. And that
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Speaker 3: is such a scary position for the person who's confused
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Speaker 3: and for the people around them who maybe don't know
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Speaker 3: how to help them.
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Speaker 2: And what about if George was he was alone, like
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Speaker 2: his wife wasn't there. He's seventy nine. What if he
9:01
Speaker 2: had tripped and fallen and it wasn't really a significant
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Speaker 2: fall where he felt a need to tell anybody, but
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Speaker 2: he had accidentally hit his head, something had happened like that,
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Speaker 2: like my mom has some stability issues now caring for
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Speaker 2: my dad, where she's fallen and hit her head, hit
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Speaker 2: her face, things like that, and she'll be like I'm fine,
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Speaker 2: I'm fine, and my brother and I keep saying like yeah,
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Speaker 2: but you don't know if you're fine or not right,
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Speaker 2: like you hurt yourself. And so if someone wasn't there
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Speaker 2: telling him, like dad, like maybe you should go get
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Speaker 2: checked out, and he just thinks he's fine, it's possible
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Speaker 2: something minor like that happened too.
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Speaker 3: Oh, totally, It's very possible that at his age he
9:37
Speaker 3: could have had a slip and fall, and just hitting
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Speaker 3: your head and maybe being mildly concussed could cause them
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Speaker 3: like confusion or rapid cognitive decline without some kind of
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Speaker 3: medical intervention. For six days, there would be no sign
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Speaker 3: of George until his family was notified that his abandoned
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Speaker 3: car had been discovered on a remote hilltop overlooking the
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Speaker 3: Tennis River in a rural wooded area in Perry County.
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Speaker 3: The keys were still in the ignition, the battery was dead,
10:07
Speaker 3: the driver's side window was down, the back door was open,
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Speaker 3: and George's cane was resting against the car. There was
10:14
Speaker 3: also a box of matches on the dashboard, even though
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Speaker 3: George had quit smoking a long time ago. The strangest
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Speaker 3: detail was that there were piles of tree branches and
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Speaker 3: brushed surrounding the vehicle, as if someone had been planning
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Speaker 3: to start a fire, and a pile of kindling was
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Speaker 3: stacked up in the back seat next to George's suit jacket.
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Speaker 3: According to George's family, it was a common habit for
10:37
Speaker 3: him to go around his house, pick up wood and
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Speaker 3: place it in piles. The only access to the hilltop
10:43
Speaker 3: was a very rough and rocky logging road, which would
10:45
Speaker 3: have been difficult for George to navigate. While there were
10:48
Speaker 3: no obvious signs of struggle or foul play. A search
10:51
Speaker 3: and rescue operation was launched in the surrounding wooded area,
10:55
Speaker 3: but they could find no trace of George. Since this
10:58
Speaker 3: location was over a hundred miles away from George's home,
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Speaker 3: no one could figure out what his car would have
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Speaker 3: been doing there.
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Speaker 2: This would be very concerning for law n versement and
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Speaker 2: the family. Like, Okay, I have this seventy nine year
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Speaker 2: old man who's missing. Then we go and we discover
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Speaker 2: his car. It's in a bizarre area, like a very
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Speaker 2: rocky logging road. It's not something that you know seventy
11:20
Speaker 2: nine year old man's would be like, Oh that's fun,
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Speaker 2: let's go right up this hilltop. But if he was
11:24
Speaker 2: confused and he kept driving up this this rough road,
11:29
Speaker 2: what if let's say he did meet like a fallen
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Speaker 2: tree branch, or he met something he couldn't kind of
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Speaker 2: navigate around, or he was driving over things that made
11:37
Speaker 2: him feel uncomfortable. He gets out, he doesn't know where
11:40
Speaker 2: he is, and one of the things that is normal
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Speaker 2: for him or comforting for him is that routine stacking
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Speaker 2: of the wood. It's interesting that the family when they
11:49
Speaker 2: heard that, weren't immediately like concerned. They said, well, my
11:53
Speaker 2: dad did do that, or George did do that? Right,
11:55
Speaker 2: this was normal for him to want to go gather wood.
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Speaker 2: Now where he puts it would be very bizarre because
12:01
Speaker 2: he's not at his home, and maybe he is placing
12:04
Speaker 2: it in the back seat around the car. But to me,
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Speaker 2: this seventy nine year old man, if he was super confused,
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Speaker 2: how far could he have gotten from his car. That's
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Speaker 2: the only part of me that says, Oh, my god,
12:15
Speaker 2: did someone meet him there? It was also an African
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Speaker 2: American man in Tennessee. It's twenty twenty three. In racism
12:22
Speaker 2: still a big deal, especially in the South. So did
12:24
Speaker 2: he meet somebody who was wanting to hurt somebody? I'm
12:28
Speaker 2: praying that he was not met with something else and that,
12:31
Speaker 2: you know, because God, that's just even more horrifying for him.
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Speaker 2: So I don't know, this is sad. My heart hurts.
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Speaker 2: I think maybe George was confused, it was trying to
12:41
Speaker 2: do something that made him feel in control and at home.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, Like I know that search efforts will often
12:49
Speaker 1: miss people's remains if they're looking through a wooded area,
12:51
Speaker 1: but the detail about George leaving behind his cane means
12:54
Speaker 1: that he wouldn't have been able to make it very far,
12:56
Speaker 1: so that does lend Creeden's to the idea that maybe
12:59
Speaker 1: this isn't just a case of someone walking and dying
13:01
Speaker 1: of exposure, and that he may have crossed passed with
13:03
Speaker 1: the wrong person and was the victim of foul play.
13:07
Speaker 1: A local television station aired a missing person's bulletin with
13:10
Speaker 1: George's photograph, and it wasn't long before a number of
13:13
Speaker 1: people came forward who claimed to have recognized him. One
13:16
Speaker 1: of these witnesses was Larry Potts, the owner of Our
13:19
Speaker 1: Garage in the town of Santa Fe, who claimed that
13:22
Speaker 1: sometime between nine and ten am on the morning of
13:25
Speaker 1: July to twenty second, George stopped at his establishment to
13:28
Speaker 1: get a flat tire repaired. This was around three hours
13:31
Speaker 1: after he had been scheduled to pick up a lean
13:33
Speaker 1: at the bus station, and it was unclear what George
13:36
Speaker 1: was doing in Santa Fe to begin with, since it
13:38
Speaker 1: was nearly fifty miles southwest of Nashville. However, Plots thought
13:42
Speaker 1: that George looked a bit confused and said he wandered
13:45
Speaker 1: around with his cane for thirty minutes while the tire
13:47
Speaker 1: was being replaced before George paid him in cash. He
13:50
Speaker 1: also recorded George asking him for directions to Nolansville before
13:54
Speaker 1: he left and turned north on Highway seven.
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Speaker 2: So he went there after he was supposed to pick
14:01
Speaker 2: up Alien, which means he left a day early and
14:05
Speaker 2: then was getting his tired changed late after he was
14:08
Speaker 2: supposed to pick her up. Where she's calling her brother
14:10
Speaker 2: saying like, hey, George isn't here. Do you think this
14:14
Speaker 2: is a mistaken identity? Larry seems to have really known
14:18
Speaker 2: who George was. Do you think he could have missed
14:20
Speaker 2: what day it was? Like maybe it was the day before.
14:23
Speaker 1: Well, that's the thing is that he was last leaving
14:26
Speaker 1: his house on Sunday afternoon, and this was the following morning.
14:29
Speaker 1: So like I could see George leaving on Monday morning
14:32
Speaker 1: and possibly becoming confused and driving in the wrong direction
14:35
Speaker 1: when he was supposed to be picking up his wife
14:37
Speaker 1: at the bus station. But it makes me wonder if
14:39
Speaker 1: he left the previous afternoon, where was he during that
14:42
Speaker 1: window of around twelve to sixteen hours before he wound
14:46
Speaker 1: up at this gas station in Santa Fe. I mean,
14:49
Speaker 1: I think the sighting from the gas station attendant is
14:51
Speaker 1: pretty convincing because George is are pretty distinct people. There
14:55
Speaker 1: couldn't have been that many elderly black people in rural
14:58
Speaker 1: Tennessee who had gone missing during that time period. And
15:01
Speaker 1: as we're going to talk about, there's another eye witness
15:04
Speaker 1: who's going to come forward who tells a very similar
15:07
Speaker 1: story to the one that Larry Potts told, which makes
15:10
Speaker 1: me think that his sighting is believable.
15:14
Speaker 3: Mary Joe Phoebus, a clerk at the Lobelville Market, claimed
15:17
Speaker 3: that a man matching George's description walked into the establishment
15:21
Speaker 3: and purchased some ice cream before walking back outside to
15:23
Speaker 3: his car. However, a few minutes later, George re entered
15:27
Speaker 3: the store to purchase some cigars, and he was also
15:30
Speaker 3: given a box of matches. But afterwards, George started talking
15:33
Speaker 3: about how he couldn't find his wife and went on
15:36
Speaker 3: about how they used to love dancing together, which gave
15:38
Speaker 3: Phoebus the impression that he may have been disoriented. She
15:42
Speaker 3: decided to call the local clinic to see if George's
15:44
Speaker 3: wife might be there, but there were no patients matching
15:47
Speaker 3: her description. George then left the market, and this was
15:51
Speaker 3: the last time that he was confirmed to be alive. However,
15:54
Speaker 3: there would be one more sighting of George's Dodge start
15:57
Speaker 3: later that afternoon. The remote hilltop with the view was
16:00
Speaker 3: discovered was about twelve miles from the market, and a
16:03
Speaker 3: local resident who lived near the site remembered seeing the
16:06
Speaker 3: dart drive uphill on the logging road towards the spot.
16:10
Speaker 3: But interestingly enough, the witness also said there was a
16:13
Speaker 3: pickup truck following George's car uphill on the same road
16:17
Speaker 3: before they saw the truck re emerge and drive downhill
16:20
Speaker 3: about fifteen to twenty minutes later. This led to speculation
16:24
Speaker 3: that the person driving the truck may have had an
16:26
Speaker 3: encounter with George on the hilltop, but neither the truck
16:29
Speaker 3: nor its driver werever identified.
16:32
Speaker 2: Oh that's heartbreaking. It does make it very concerning that. Okay,
16:36
Speaker 2: I saw this distinct car going up this logging road.
16:39
Speaker 2: It doesn't really fit there, and then all of a
16:42
Speaker 2: sudden there's a truck right behind it and it comes
16:45
Speaker 2: down about fifteen to twenty minutes later. I wonder if
16:48
Speaker 2: this person had seen him and had noticed that he
16:51
Speaker 2: was not stable and thought, Okay, this is a very
16:56
Speaker 2: easy target. Not only is the elderly, but he's clearly
16:59
Speaker 2: struggling with is you know, cognitive ability, And so maybe
17:03
Speaker 2: they saw him as somebody they could attack or steal
17:06
Speaker 2: from or take his car. I don't know. It seems
17:09
Speaker 2: like obviously he's a prime candidate to be somebody that
17:13
Speaker 2: would be hurt by another person. But why what did
17:17
Speaker 2: George have? He was seventy nine, Like, unless he was
17:19
Speaker 2: talking about money and jewelry and things like that he had,
17:21
Speaker 2: what would someone want from him?
17:25
Speaker 1: I mean that would make sense, Like under different circumstances.
17:27
Speaker 1: I might think that the presence of the pickup truck
17:30
Speaker 1: is just a coincidence. But there was this was a
17:32
Speaker 1: very remote logging road. So what are the odds that
17:34
Speaker 1: this truck would be following George's car around the exact
17:37
Speaker 1: same time, unless you, like you said, someone saw George
17:40
Speaker 1: in town, Bobby looked vulnerable and decided to follow him,
17:44
Speaker 1: and when George stopped at this remote spot, the driver
17:47
Speaker 1: of the truck then decided to take advantage of the situation.
17:50
Speaker 2: Or you have someone who's a coward and says this
17:52
Speaker 2: is an old man, an old black man, who's weak
17:55
Speaker 2: and things like that, And I'm going to take out
17:57
Speaker 2: my you know, bias season and racism and hatred on
18:01
Speaker 2: this man because he won't even know what's going on,
18:04
Speaker 2: do you know what I mean? Like, I don't know,
18:06
Speaker 2: I don't know. Now I feel like someone hurt him.
18:09
Speaker 3: Strange that at this moment between this very small window
18:13
Speaker 3: of time that somebody who would be capable of murdering
18:16
Speaker 3: him could have done it. But also they did a
18:19
Speaker 3: thorough search and he didn't have his cane, so how
18:22
Speaker 3: far could he have really gone? And if he was murdered,
18:26
Speaker 3: what did the perpetrator do with him?
18:28
Speaker 1: And that's what I'm thinking, is that they didn't kill
18:30
Speaker 1: him at the scene, but could have abducted him in
18:32
Speaker 1: the pickup truck. And that's why he was seen coming
18:34
Speaker 1: down the hill only fifteen to twenty minutes later. So George,
18:37
Speaker 1: if he was murdered, his body could be at a
18:39
Speaker 1: completely different location.
18:42
Speaker 3: It just sounds like they're really opening themselves up to
18:44
Speaker 3: great risk, right, Like once you abduct somebody, it just
18:48
Speaker 3: feels like the risk is far greater than to murder
18:50
Speaker 3: them at the scene, Like what would you possibly want
18:53
Speaker 3: with his physical body?
18:56
Speaker 1: So Based on the reports of George's behavior at the
18:58
Speaker 1: garage and the market, it was theorized that he might
19:01
Speaker 1: have suffered a medical issue, such as a minor stroke,
19:03
Speaker 1: which caused him to become confused and drive to a
19:06
Speaker 1: remote location over one hundred miles from his home before
19:09
Speaker 1: he vanished. Sadly, Aleen Owens was left completely devastated by
19:13
Speaker 1: her husband's disappearance, stating quote, after being together all that time,
19:17
Speaker 1: I can't get used to losing him, least not the
19:20
Speaker 1: way I lost him end quote. She eventually moved out
19:23
Speaker 1: of her house into an apartment and passed away in
19:25
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty nine. The case would be profiled on an
19:28
Speaker 1: episode of Unsolved Mysteries in August of nineteen ninety two,
19:31
Speaker 1: and it featured interviews with George's brother, Alfred, but the
19:35
Speaker 1: segment failed to generate any promising new leads. The following year,
19:39
Speaker 1: George was legally declared dead and his grandson would inherit
19:42
Speaker 1: thirty three thousand dollars from his estate. But after thirty
19:45
Speaker 1: eight years, there's still no answers about what actually happened
19:48
Speaker 1: to George Owens. So I guess you could say the
19:51
Speaker 1: path went chilly.
19:53
Speaker 2: As when you read about how Aileen was talking about
19:56
Speaker 2: how I just can't get used to losing him, at
19:59
Speaker 2: least not the way I lost him. It's so crazy true.
20:03
Speaker 2: These two had been high school sweethearts. Their entire world
20:07
Speaker 2: was one another. Like people think, oh, okay, it's this
20:10
Speaker 2: person who you talk to and those kinds of things,
20:12
Speaker 2: But when you lose a spouse, it's someone that used
20:15
Speaker 2: to put their hand on your back when you were cooking,
20:18
Speaker 2: or tease you while you're brushing your teeth, or like
20:20
Speaker 2: all these little moments, even the moments that you want
20:22
Speaker 2: to kill them, right, it's those moments that you miss
20:25
Speaker 2: so badly. And I Aileen had been with him for
20:29
Speaker 2: how long, like sixty sixty some odd years, so she
20:32
Speaker 2: doesn't know a life without him. And now she's left saying,
20:36
Speaker 2: not only did he pass away, which is part of life,
20:39
Speaker 2: it's part of loving as you lose, but you lose
20:42
Speaker 2: in natural ways or you get prepared to lose them.
20:45
Speaker 2: And here she really thought he was coming to pick
20:48
Speaker 2: her up at the bus station, and he never showed up.
20:50
Speaker 2: And she also never got to have his body to
20:54
Speaker 2: make decisions of. You know, is he going to be buried?
20:57
Speaker 2: Is he going to be cremated. Do I get his remains?
20:59
Speaker 2: Do you know? And do we get to celebrate him
21:01
Speaker 2: in the way that he would want? Do I get
21:03
Speaker 2: to bury his body? None of those things came, which
21:07
Speaker 2: provides finality to a death right. George just disappeared. So
21:12
Speaker 2: Aileen has this idea of I lost my partner and
21:15
Speaker 2: they really might be lost, like I don't know where
21:18
Speaker 2: he is, so oh my god, my heart breaks. My
21:20
Speaker 2: heart breaks so badly for them.
21:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, you reach a point where you get to be
21:25
Speaker 1: that age and you know that one of these days
21:27
Speaker 1: my spouse is probably going to pass away of natural causes.
21:30
Speaker 1: But this is a completely different animal when your spouse
21:32
Speaker 1: just vanishes without a trace and you have no idea
21:35
Speaker 1: what happened to them. Because it's very rare for an
21:37
Speaker 1: elderly person to just go missing and never be found.
21:40
Speaker 1: But it's particularly sad when it involves someone who was
21:42
Speaker 1: married to his spouse for sixty years since they were teenagers,
21:46
Speaker 1: and now she has to live the rest of her
21:48
Speaker 1: life not knowing what happened to him.
21:50
Speaker 3: And they probably wanted to be buried beside each other.
21:53
Speaker 3: Like how sad is that? Where you plan your whole life.
21:57
Speaker 3: You're married for so long and you're just kind of
22:01
Speaker 3: in the winter of your life, right You're coming close
22:03
Speaker 3: to the end, and you have the person that you
22:06
Speaker 3: love with you, and you think that when it comes
22:09
Speaker 3: my time to depart the earthly plane, I'm going to
22:12
Speaker 3: have my body beside the person that I love and
22:15
Speaker 3: we will rest eternally there. And to have that taken
22:18
Speaker 3: away from you, it's just it's so sad. And for
22:21
Speaker 3: those other family members who remain, they don't have a
22:25
Speaker 3: grave to go to, and this case just breaks my heart.
22:29
Speaker 1: So if you were to ask an Unsolved Mysteries fan
22:32
Speaker 1: which moments from the show put a major lump in
22:34
Speaker 1: their throat, many of them would respond by uttering these
22:37
Speaker 1: five words quote, I can't find my wife. Yes. The
22:40
Speaker 1: reenactment depicting a disorient to George Owen's reminiscing about his
22:44
Speaker 1: wife in the market and acting concerned about being unable
22:47
Speaker 1: to find her is definitely one of the most heartbreaking
22:50
Speaker 1: scenes in the history of the show. Say what you
22:52
Speaker 1: will about the quality of the acting in some of
22:54
Speaker 1: these reenactments, but the elderly actor they found to play
22:57
Speaker 1: George was very, very good, and that scene is one
23:00
Speaker 1: of the big reasons people still remember this story all
23:03
Speaker 1: these years later. But as you can imagine, it's quite
23:06
Speaker 1: frustrating that this segment is currently not available for viewing
23:09
Speaker 1: on the usual channels. Now. I'm sure you know that
23:12
Speaker 1: I have a particular fascination with mysteries in which someone
23:15
Speaker 1: goes missing or is found dead at a faraway location
23:19
Speaker 1: the victim had no reason to be at and while
23:21
Speaker 1: this story definitely fits that criteria, it's less mysterious when
23:25
Speaker 1: you're dealing with an elderly victim. It seems very likely
23:29
Speaker 1: that the reason George wound up in a remote area
23:31
Speaker 1: over one hundred miles from his home was because he
23:34
Speaker 1: suffered some sort of medical issue which affected his memory,
23:37
Speaker 1: whether it be a minor stroke or an undiagnosed case
23:40
Speaker 1: of Alzheimer's or dementia. Years before they aired this segment,
23:44
Speaker 1: unsolved mysteries that actually profiled a similar story about another
23:48
Speaker 1: elderly African American man named Rogers Kane, who vanished after
23:52
Speaker 1: leaving his home in Los Angeles, and his abandoned car
23:55
Speaker 1: was eventually found on a city street. Based on the
23:58
Speaker 1: accounts of some eyewitness who interacted with Rogers signs pointed
24:02
Speaker 1: to him having some sort of medical issue which caused
24:05
Speaker 1: him to lose his memory and forget who he was.
24:08
Speaker 1: While Rogers was never found, the best case scenario is
24:11
Speaker 1: that someone could have picked him up and taken him
24:13
Speaker 1: to a medical facility for treatment, where he lived out
24:16
Speaker 1: the remainder of his life as a John Doe because
24:19
Speaker 1: no one could identify him. But in this case, George
24:22
Speaker 1: Owens's vehicle was found in a rural, wooden area in
24:24
Speaker 1: the middle of nowhere, so the odds of him being
24:27
Speaker 1: picked up by a good Samaritan and taken somewhere for
24:30
Speaker 1: treatment are not great, no matter what you believe happened
24:33
Speaker 1: to George. The visual from the unsawd Mystery segment of
24:36
Speaker 1: his abandoned Dodge Dart sitting on that remote hilltop with
24:40
Speaker 1: a pile of kindling in the back seat and George's
24:43
Speaker 1: cane resting against the car is incredibly eerie.
24:46
Speaker 2: It is it's so scary when you have the idea
24:49
Speaker 2: that that truck followed him up. If you had just
24:51
Speaker 2: said that his Dodge Dart went up that road and
24:55
Speaker 2: the neighborhood seen that, that's it makes sense with the
24:58
Speaker 2: kind of cognitive issues we were talking about. But once
25:02
Speaker 2: that truck goes and comes straight back down, like, did
25:04
Speaker 2: they not see this elderly man? If they did, did
25:07
Speaker 2: they go up after him? What was what was happening?
25:10
Speaker 2: So that truck is what really turns my stomach. What
25:14
Speaker 2: it's also interesting is that Roger Caine case. Like you said,
25:17
Speaker 2: it's this elderly man who is has left his house
25:21
Speaker 2: and possibly got picked up for a medical issue and
25:24
Speaker 2: just simply couldn't remember who he was. Have you guys
25:27
Speaker 2: seen or listened to the podcast Room twenty about the
25:31
Speaker 2: guy named sixty six Garage? No, no, oh my god,
25:34
Speaker 2: it's so good. So it was one of those I
25:36
Speaker 2: just found on a road trip back to Florida. But
25:38
Speaker 2: it's called Room twenty, and it was about a unnamed
25:42
Speaker 2: patient that's at this facility and he's unconscious, and does
25:47
Speaker 2: it They don't know who he is, and so above
25:49
Speaker 2: his bettages says sixty six garage, which is I think
25:51
Speaker 2: the street number in this place that they found him,
25:54
Speaker 2: but no one knew who he was, And so the
25:56
Speaker 2: podcast is this reporter chasing down who this man's identity was.
26:00
Speaker 2: But I remember that whole time thinking someone is sitting
26:04
Speaker 2: at home going where is my loved one? And what's
26:08
Speaker 2: really sad is that the person is alive. And if
26:10
Speaker 2: rog just really was taken to a hospital and treated
26:14
Speaker 2: as a John Doe, that poor family missed being able
26:19
Speaker 2: to be beside him and to be there when he
26:21
Speaker 2: passed away. In those types of things heartbreaking. We know
26:25
Speaker 2: George didn't suffer a fate like that, because George was
26:28
Speaker 2: up on this hill. No one in that truck I
26:31
Speaker 2: doubt took him with them, because they would have been
26:35
Speaker 2: able to say this is this truck's registered to George Owen's,
26:37
Speaker 2: Like I found him, I put him in my car,
26:39
Speaker 2: I took him to the hospital, and this is where
26:41
Speaker 2: his car is. They would be able to identify George immediately.
26:46
Speaker 3: You would hope in cases like Roger just or if
26:49
Speaker 3: that was the case that he was in a facility
26:52
Speaker 3: and they didn't know who he was or he wasn't
26:54
Speaker 3: able to communicate that, or like the one you were
26:57
Speaker 3: talking about Ash, that they would put their DNA in
27:01
Speaker 3: like ancestry dot com or something like that in those
27:05
Speaker 3: databases and hope that family members would have also put
27:09
Speaker 3: their DNA in there in the off chance that maybe
27:12
Speaker 3: they would get a match. It seems like now there's
27:15
Speaker 3: a lot more tools for that, but back then it's
27:18
Speaker 3: just how would you ever communicate that.
27:22
Speaker 2: You wouldn't be able to. I mean, that's a thing
27:24
Speaker 2: that's so difficult, especially for poor George. Back okay, back
27:27
Speaker 2: in eighty five. You know, God bless they. They surely
27:30
Speaker 2: weren't running DNA or anything like that. So if George
27:33
Speaker 2: had been brought in and wasn't maybe near his car
27:36
Speaker 2: when he was located by somebody who was being a
27:38
Speaker 2: good Smaritan, I don't know that they would have had
27:40
Speaker 2: technology like that, But in George's case, it seems far
27:43
Speaker 2: less likely than in the other cases we were talking about.
27:47
Speaker 3: And they didn't even have the Internet, Like, no one
27:49
Speaker 3: was on the internet in nineteen eighty five, so spreading
27:51
Speaker 3: information was far more difficult. And what adds an extra
27:57
Speaker 3: element of tragedy to this story is that George sounded
27:59
Speaker 3: like an all around good person, and he left behind
28:02
Speaker 3: a wife, Eileen, whom he'd been with, who'd been with
28:06
Speaker 3: him for sixty years. As you can imagine, it was
28:10
Speaker 3: not easy for Eleen to adjust to life without him,
28:13
Speaker 3: but it was extra difficult since he'd gone missing and
28:15
Speaker 3: she had no idea if he was actually dead or
28:18
Speaker 3: alive somewhere. It sounds like George and a Leen rarely
28:21
Speaker 3: spent time apart, so it was just bad luck that
28:24
Speaker 3: he may have suffered some sort of medical issue on
28:27
Speaker 3: the one day she happened to be out of town
28:29
Speaker 3: visiting relatives. If this had occurred while Eleen was at home,
28:34
Speaker 3: she may have been able to prevent George from driving off. Now,
28:38
Speaker 3: on the basis of the unsolved mystery segment, Robin had
28:41
Speaker 3: initially theorized in his Trail Link Cold episode that George
28:45
Speaker 3: became confused well honest way to pick up a lien
28:47
Speaker 3: at the bus station in Nashville on the morning of Monday,
28:50
Speaker 3: July twenty second, which caused him to drive in the
28:53
Speaker 3: wrong direction and become lost. However, upon further research, it
28:57
Speaker 3: now seems that George may have actually left to tell
29:00
Speaker 3: him on Sunday the twenty first. We have neighbors claiming
29:03
Speaker 3: they saw George driving away from the house that afternoon,
29:06
Speaker 3: and there were two place settings found at the table
29:09
Speaker 3: with what Aileen specifically described as their Sunday dinnerware, even
29:13
Speaker 3: though her bus was not scheduled to arrive until Monday,
29:16
Speaker 3: morning at six thirty am. So I get the impression
29:19
Speaker 3: that George had gotten it into his head that he
29:22
Speaker 3: was going to pick up his wife that day and
29:24
Speaker 3: bring her home for Sunday dinner.
29:26
Speaker 2: That's exactly what I think happened. I think that he
29:29
Speaker 2: left the day early, He got to the bus station
29:32
Speaker 2: and thought, Okay, where is she. He's already confused, so
29:36
Speaker 2: these facts not lining up makes him even more confused.
29:40
Speaker 2: He asks for directions and he tries to follow those.
29:44
Speaker 2: If he ends up somewhere he's not familiar with, again,
29:46
Speaker 2: it's going to complicate the disposition that he's in. And
29:51
Speaker 2: you even have people saying that up through the twenty thirds.
29:53
Speaker 2: So for two days, he's telling people he can't find
29:56
Speaker 2: his wife, he needs to go forget his wife, and
29:59
Speaker 2: he's getting further further away from his home. So it
30:02
Speaker 2: seems very probable that that was the reality of what
30:05
Speaker 2: was happening. Was this mental distress or kind of lack
30:09
Speaker 2: of knowledge of really what was happening his reality. But
30:13
Speaker 2: I think at some point it is possible that someone
30:15
Speaker 2: watched that and said, ah, what an easy target. I'm
30:19
Speaker 2: going to follow him.
30:21
Speaker 1: Alien said she last spoke to George. On the phone
30:24
Speaker 1: on the afternoon of the twenty first, and did not
30:26
Speaker 1: notice anything unusual, as George said he was going to
30:29
Speaker 1: meet her at the bus station the following morning, so
30:31
Speaker 1: it must have been a short time later that he
30:33
Speaker 1: suffered a stroke or something which caused him to become
30:36
Speaker 1: confused and disoriented. In fact, it's possible that George even
30:40
Speaker 1: drove to the bus station to pick up Alien on
30:42
Speaker 1: the twenty first and was totally thrown off when she
30:44
Speaker 1: failed to show up, which explains why he was later
30:47
Speaker 1: seen rambling on about how he couldn't find his wife.
30:50
Speaker 1: The next confirmed sighting of George took place between nine
30:53
Speaker 1: and ten am on the morning of the twenty second,
30:55
Speaker 1: when he stopped at the garage in Santa Fe to
30:57
Speaker 1: get his tire replaced. According to the Larry Potts, George
31:01
Speaker 1: appeared to be lost and asked for directions before he left.
31:05
Speaker 1: This might go a long way towards explaining why George
31:08
Speaker 1: wound up where he did, because it sounds like he
31:10
Speaker 1: asked for directions to Nolansville, but there may have been
31:13
Speaker 1: a misunderstanding and Potts instead gave him the directions to Lobilville,
31:17
Speaker 1: which was over fifty miles in the opposite direction, and
31:21
Speaker 1: sure enough, George was seen in Lobilville the following day.
31:24
Speaker 2: Oh, poor thing. It is very possible that either Larry
31:28
Speaker 2: was mistaken when he heard what George asked for and
31:32
Speaker 2: or maybe George interpreted it wrong, like maybe Larry was
31:36
Speaker 2: right and George went the opposite way. Oh, it's so sad,
31:40
Speaker 2: poor Larry's going. Like, Oh man, I saw him, Like
31:43
Speaker 2: I changed his tires for him. I knew he was leaving.
31:47
Speaker 2: I feel sad for him, and I feel sad for
31:49
Speaker 2: the people that said I saw him and I could
31:52
Speaker 2: tell you was struggling, because what do you do. You
31:55
Speaker 2: don't know somebody's disposition or what did He's at a
31:59
Speaker 2: point you need to intervene or anything to that extent.
32:02
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Like you can see the interview with Mary
32:04
Speaker 1: Joe Phoebus, the store clerk at the market, who clearly
32:07
Speaker 1: seems haunted by the fact that even though she did
32:09
Speaker 1: what she could to try and help George, she felt
32:12
Speaker 1: she could have done more and maybe would have prevented
32:14
Speaker 1: him from disappearing. But at that point, you just never know.
32:17
Speaker 1: You're not going to have alarm bells and feel that
32:19
Speaker 1: this person is just going to vanish without a trace.
32:22
Speaker 2: And it's one of those things. Could you imagine being like, sir,
32:24
Speaker 2: you're not making sense, Sir, you're confused, and he's he's not.
32:29
Speaker 2: He has his faculties to him, and like that could
32:31
Speaker 2: get really awkward and confrontational pretty quick. It's hard to judge.
32:36
Speaker 2: Like I watch people with different abilities and things like that,
32:40
Speaker 2: and I always go, should I help? Should I reach
32:42
Speaker 2: for that? Should I ask them if I can get this?
32:44
Speaker 2: Or is that frustrating for them? Do you know what
32:47
Speaker 2: I mean? Like, because they're very capable of doing it
32:49
Speaker 2: by themselves in their own way, so it's, oh, I
32:52
Speaker 2: don't know. It's very hard as an onlooker to know
32:55
Speaker 2: when to intervene and when not to. When it's someone's health, right,
32:58
Speaker 2: when someone's getting hurt, it's easy to say you should intervene,
33:01
Speaker 2: But with medical stuff or not knowing if it's medical stuff,
33:04
Speaker 2: that gets a lot harder.
33:06
Speaker 3: It's highly individual, right, like somebody may want the help,
33:10
Speaker 3: but then you go and try to provide the exact
33:12
Speaker 3: same help to another person and they may be offended.
33:16
Speaker 3: So it is very difficult to tell if he would
33:19
Speaker 3: take kindly to this, or if he would find it
33:21
Speaker 3: really offensive that somebody is insinuating that he doesn't have
33:25
Speaker 3: his wits about him. So I can see how all
33:28
Speaker 3: of these bystanders who encountered him and tried to do
33:31
Speaker 3: what they could feel guilty about it. But I do
33:34
Speaker 3: believe that they did everything that was kind of in
33:36
Speaker 3: their power at that time, Like what were they supposed
33:39
Speaker 3: to do? Call the police, call an ambulance and be like,
33:42
Speaker 3: this man is confused. I feel like that would have
33:44
Speaker 3: been overstepping and they would have had no way of
33:47
Speaker 3: knowing that this was going to.
33:49
Speaker 2: Happen to George.
33:51
Speaker 3: Now, in missing persons cases, you're always going to have
33:53
Speaker 3: sightings of the victim from eyewitnesses who were mistaken about
33:57
Speaker 3: who they saw. But given where George's car all time
34:00
Speaker 3: wound up, I think it's safe to say that the
34:02
Speaker 3: eyewitness sightings in this case are accurate, and the evidence
34:07
Speaker 3: indicates that George wound up in an unfamiliar place because
34:10
Speaker 3: he was disoriented. The Loboville Market clerk Mary Joe Phoebus
34:15
Speaker 3: was interviewed on Unsolved Mysteries, and she was clearly haunted
34:18
Speaker 3: by the fact that, even though she made an attempt
34:21
Speaker 3: to call the local clinic to help George find his wife.
34:24
Speaker 3: She wished she would have done more to help him.
34:26
Speaker 3: At first, people were baffled when a box of matches
34:29
Speaker 3: were found on the dashboard of George's car, since he'd
34:32
Speaker 3: given up smoking a long time ago, but Phoebus confirmed
34:36
Speaker 3: that she gave these matches to him when he purchased
34:38
Speaker 3: cigars at the market. Even if George had not smoked
34:42
Speaker 3: in a while, he may have brought the cigars instinctively
34:45
Speaker 3: because he was remembering an old habit.
34:48
Speaker 2: He very much could have when he is sitting there
34:50
Speaker 2: and doing the cigars. Also, I think when he is
34:52
Speaker 2: stacking that wood, it's all going back to those old habits.
34:55
Speaker 2: It's okay. Things that you talk to someone like you
34:59
Speaker 2: were saying, Jules, your grandmother had Alzheimer's or dementia. They
35:03
Speaker 2: start to regress back to like a younger year. They'll
35:05
Speaker 2: think their parents are still alive. They'll think a sibling
35:08
Speaker 2: that's passed is still alive. They'll think they're living in
35:11
Speaker 2: their childhood home, right. They start to kind of go
35:13
Speaker 2: backwards into their memories that are comforting, that are secure,
35:17
Speaker 2: and so the smoking, the stacking wood, the standing outside
35:20
Speaker 2: his car with his cane right anything that is his
35:23
Speaker 2: family was saying, Oh, he used to do that or
35:25
Speaker 2: that was normal for him when he was at his home.
35:28
Speaker 2: I could see those being the behaviors that he's doing
35:30
Speaker 2: in the midst of being completely distressed. That's his familiar comfort.
35:35
Speaker 1: And he also when he mentioned in the mark about
35:37
Speaker 1: how he and his wife used to go dancing together,
35:39
Speaker 1: So it's almost like he's bringing up this happy memory
35:42
Speaker 1: of him in a leen to deal with the stress
35:44
Speaker 1: of not being able to find her. Given that it
35:47
Speaker 1: takes just over an hour to drive from Santa Fe
35:49
Speaker 1: to Lobelville and these separate sightings took place over twenty
35:52
Speaker 1: four hours apart, this begs the question what was George
35:56
Speaker 1: doing during that period of time. In fact, if he
35:59
Speaker 1: actually left his home in Nolansville on the twenty first,
36:02
Speaker 1: what were his whereabouts before he turned up in Santa
36:04
Speaker 1: Fe on the morning of the twenty second. It's incredibly
36:08
Speaker 1: sad to think that George may have been driving around
36:10
Speaker 1: aimlessly looking for his wife for nearly two straight days,
36:13
Speaker 1: and you have to wonder if he spent these nights
36:15
Speaker 1: sleeping inside his car. It's still not clear how George's
36:19
Speaker 1: car wound up on that remote hilltop twelve miles outside
36:22
Speaker 1: of Lobosville. But he may have simply gotten lost and
36:25
Speaker 1: became very confused when he arrived at the location, since
36:28
Speaker 1: there was only one road in or out of there.
36:30
Speaker 1: On the surface, the detail about the piles of kidling
36:33
Speaker 1: being found inside and around the car might seem pretty baffling,
36:37
Speaker 1: but like we said, it just makes more sense after
36:39
Speaker 1: you learned that George had a habit of collecting wood
36:42
Speaker 1: and assembling piles at his house, so once again it
36:45
Speaker 1: seems like he may have instinctively been doing something which
36:48
Speaker 1: was a familiar habit. I know that Aileen expressed her
36:51
Speaker 1: belief that George would not have placed that kidling in
36:53
Speaker 1: the back seat because he always went out of his
36:56
Speaker 1: way to keep his car spotless. But if he was disoriented,
36:59
Speaker 1: he would have been capable of anything. It's possible George
37:03
Speaker 1: did this because he was planning to spend the night
37:05
Speaker 1: at that location. But of course the big mystery is
37:08
Speaker 1: what ultimately happened to him.
37:10
Speaker 2: And how far could he have gotten. Like you said, Robin,
37:12
Speaker 2: his cane was there, and if he needed a cane,
37:16
Speaker 2: then he couldn't sit there and walk down this rugged
37:19
Speaker 2: logging road. This wasn't, you know, a park, This wasn't
37:22
Speaker 2: a nature preserve or something like that. They were describing
37:26
Speaker 2: this as a pretty rough logging road that you typically
37:30
Speaker 2: wouldn't drive up unless you had a purpose of driving
37:32
Speaker 2: up there. So when you also look at the wood
37:34
Speaker 2: in the back seat, I think, with all of his faculties, no,
37:38
Speaker 2: of course, no one's going to be putting wood in
37:39
Speaker 2: their car. But for all we know, he thought that
37:42
Speaker 2: that was the back of a truck he was supposed
37:44
Speaker 2: to be loading the firewood into, or he was trying
37:47
Speaker 2: to prepare for you know, the winter or something, and
37:51
Speaker 2: he's kind of hoarding the wood in the car. We
37:53
Speaker 2: don't know what George was going through at that point
37:55
Speaker 2: to say he wouldn't have put the wood in there.
37:58
Speaker 2: He very well might have not been thinking that this
38:01
Speaker 2: is my car. He could have been cognitively thinking he
38:04
Speaker 2: was somewhere else while he was doing that. I find
38:07
Speaker 2: it really disturbing that George's body still has not been found,
38:11
Speaker 2: that there's been no remains around that area that are
38:14
Speaker 2: linked to George. Did someone put him in that truck
38:17
Speaker 2: and take him somewhere else?
38:20
Speaker 3: Well, of course, the obvious explanation would be that George
38:23
Speaker 3: wandered away from his car into the woods and died
38:25
Speaker 3: of exposure. Even though an extensive search and rescue operation
38:30
Speaker 3: was launched and they failed to find George's body, He'd
38:33
Speaker 3: already been missing for a week by that point, so
38:35
Speaker 3: any number of things could have happened to his remains,
38:38
Speaker 3: such as them being torn apart and spread around by animals.
38:42
Speaker 3: There are numerous documented cases where an individual has gone
38:45
Speaker 3: missing in a remote wilderness area and a search effort
38:49
Speaker 3: failed to turn up anything, but then years later someone
38:52
Speaker 3: just happens to stumble across the victim's remains, as they
38:55
Speaker 3: had been completely missed during the original search. I guess
38:59
Speaker 3: what different this case from many others is that George
39:03
Speaker 3: left his cane behind, and you have to wonder how
39:06
Speaker 3: far he would have been able to walk without it. Theoretically,
39:09
Speaker 3: if he did succumb to exposure, this would have occurred
39:12
Speaker 3: only a short distance from his vehicle, making him easier
39:15
Speaker 3: to find. But as it's been proven time and time again,
39:19
Speaker 3: even the best search and rescue operations can miss human remains. However,
39:24
Speaker 3: the one detail which might lend credence to the idea
39:27
Speaker 3: of George being a victim of foul play. Is the
39:30
Speaker 3: eyewitness sighting of the pickup truck, which appeared to be
39:33
Speaker 3: following George's dodge start on the logging road towards the
39:36
Speaker 3: hilltop where the vehicle was found. That same truck was
39:41
Speaker 3: then seen heading back down the road in the opposite direction,
39:44
Speaker 3: and the driver has never been identified. Now, this occurred
39:47
Speaker 3: in Perry County, which is the least densely populated county
39:51
Speaker 3: in the state of Tennessee. So what are the odds
39:54
Speaker 3: of two strangers driving separate vehicles on that very remote
39:58
Speaker 3: logging road so close together.
40:00
Speaker 2: It's interesting too, with such a remote place, you'd think
40:03
Speaker 2: that the neighbor, if this was kind of a common
40:05
Speaker 2: truck that was going up and down that logging road,
40:07
Speaker 2: that they'd be like, oh yeah, like that's you know,
40:09
Speaker 2: we see that truck every Monday through Friday or whatever.
40:13
Speaker 2: But it is a truck on a logging road. So
40:16
Speaker 2: I wonder if it was someone just simply passing by
40:20
Speaker 2: and simply you know, like went and buy a car
40:23
Speaker 2: that had no one there, or George's out there and
40:25
Speaker 2: he's fine, he appears fine, he's talking to him, and
40:28
Speaker 2: passes by or you might mind your own dang business
40:31
Speaker 2: on a logging road and just keep going. But he
40:33
Speaker 2: came back so quickly as what's bizarre, Like if you
40:36
Speaker 2: were driving up this logging road for work, for a purpose,
40:39
Speaker 2: I feel like whatever you were doing up there would
40:41
Speaker 2: take more than fifteen minutes.
40:43
Speaker 1: And we do know that the driver this pickup truck
40:45
Speaker 1: never did come forwards to confirm and say that, Oh yeah,
40:48
Speaker 1: I went up that logging road and I saw an
40:50
Speaker 1: old man standing outside his car, but he looked completely fine.
40:53
Speaker 1: But then again, you also have to remember it's nineteen
40:55
Speaker 1: eighty five. Information doesn't travel as quickly this is world tennesseee.
40:59
Speaker 1: So even if the driver of the pickup truck is innocent,
41:02
Speaker 1: maybe he just never even heard about George's disappearance and
41:05
Speaker 1: that's why he never came forward and provided any information.
41:09
Speaker 1: But then you also have to ask yourself why would
41:11
Speaker 1: they be driving up there to begin with? Since it
41:14
Speaker 1: sounds like this road was the only way to reach
41:16
Speaker 1: the hilltop. You'd have to think that even if the
41:18
Speaker 1: pickup truck driver was a completely innocent bystander, they would
41:22
Speaker 1: have at least seen George up there and might have
41:24
Speaker 1: had some useful information to offer. But on the other hand,
41:27
Speaker 1: if the driver harmed or abducted George, perhaps they drove
41:30
Speaker 1: away from the location with his body inside their truck,
41:33
Speaker 1: which would explain why he was never found. I guess
41:36
Speaker 1: it's possible that someone could have seen George acting confused
41:39
Speaker 1: and disoriented in lobile Bille, and because of his age,
41:42
Speaker 1: they decided to take advantage of the situation and followed
41:45
Speaker 1: him to this remote location. George was wearing a gold
41:49
Speaker 1: watch and a ruby ring at the time he went missing,
41:52
Speaker 1: and neither of these items were found, so this could
41:54
Speaker 1: have made him the potential target for a robbery. And
41:57
Speaker 1: given that he was an African American man and this
42:00
Speaker 1: the rural Deep South, perhaps he was targeted for some
42:03
Speaker 1: sort of hate crime by a racist local. Of course,
42:06
Speaker 1: these theories are nothing more than speculation, and without the
42:09
Speaker 1: sighting of the pickup truck, there probably would be any
42:12
Speaker 1: reason at all to suspect that George was the victim
42:14
Speaker 1: of foul play. The eyewitness also said that the truck
42:18
Speaker 1: was only out of sight for about fifteen to twenty
42:20
Speaker 1: minutes before it drove back down the logging road, which
42:23
Speaker 1: doesn't sound like nearly enough time. To dispose of George's
42:26
Speaker 1: body unless they took George with them when they left
42:29
Speaker 1: the sea, But given the remoteness of the location, why
42:32
Speaker 1: would they bother to do that? So in the end,
42:35
Speaker 1: I do think the most logical explanation is that George
42:38
Speaker 1: simply wandered off into the woods and died of exposure
42:41
Speaker 1: and they just simply never found his body. But unless
42:44
Speaker 1: they uncover any evidence someday, we'll probably never know for certain.
42:48
Speaker 1: All that being said, if you happen to have any
42:50
Speaker 1: information on the unsolved disappearance of George Owens, please contact
42:54
Speaker 1: the appropriate authorities. Jules Ashley, any final thoughts on this case?
42:59
Speaker 2: So sad when you guys are talking about this case
43:03
Speaker 2: and you talk about both Aileen and George and their
43:07
Speaker 2: love for each other. George probably was for two days
43:12
Speaker 2: frantically trying to find the love of his life, and
43:14
Speaker 2: he's talking to people about how wonderful she is and
43:18
Speaker 2: how he needs to find her, and he's worried about
43:21
Speaker 2: not finding her, and how they are so in love
43:23
Speaker 2: and used to dance, and I mean, it's just this
43:25
Speaker 2: like classic older man who's just enthralled and in love
43:30
Speaker 2: with this woman and he's scared because he can't find her.
43:33
Speaker 2: It's so sad. And then you have Aileen who said,
43:36
Speaker 2: what is life without him?
43:38
Speaker 1: Like?
43:38
Speaker 2: I don't know how to live without him? And even
43:41
Speaker 2: though that was going to be a possibility and reality
43:43
Speaker 2: soon for us because of our age or like it's
43:45
Speaker 2: a reality, it wasn't going to be like this. And
43:49
Speaker 2: I was going to get to say goodbye to him,
43:51
Speaker 2: whether it was as a deceased body that I'm saying
43:54
Speaker 2: goodbye to or while he's passing away, I'd get to
43:57
Speaker 2: be there with him and say goodbye, Like that's that's
44:00
Speaker 2: the logical thing that would make sense. And yet she
44:03
Speaker 2: didn't have any of that. She was left with where
44:07
Speaker 2: is he? What happened to him? And, like we've said
44:10
Speaker 2: a million times, when you don't know the answer to that,
44:13
Speaker 2: your brain goes everywhere trying to fill in the details,
44:17
Speaker 2: and fear and sadness and just you know, hopelessness kind
44:21
Speaker 2: of takes over. I pray to God that I'm seventy
44:25
Speaker 2: nine and loving my husband just as much, and I
44:29
Speaker 2: just pray that they find a body that matches George's
44:33
Speaker 2: because it was important to know what happened to him.
44:36
Speaker 2: He was loved he was an amazing human and without
44:40
Speaker 2: the answers, it's just sad. You were right. This is
44:43
Speaker 2: one of the saddest cases we've talked about.
44:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, this case has really touched me. I mean, you
44:49
Speaker 3: can't really think of a sadder case like I'm looking
44:51
Speaker 3: for my wife and just to think of George's potential
44:54
Speaker 3: last moments if he met with foul play or if
44:57
Speaker 3: he was just seized shortly thereafter after that the last
45:01
Speaker 3: days of his life were found looking for a lean
45:04
Speaker 3: woman who he clearly spent so much time with and
45:06
Speaker 3: loved so much. It just breaks my heart for this
45:09
Speaker 3: whole family. And it just seems like the percentage of
45:14
Speaker 3: chance that you would encounter somebody who would do you
45:17
Speaker 3: harm when you're an elderly man in a situation such
45:21
Speaker 3: as this, it just it doesn't seem that likely. But
45:24
Speaker 3: I lean towards there being a potential for foul play because,
45:29
Speaker 3: like we mentioned, this is like the smallest county, and
45:32
Speaker 3: this is pretty unpopulated, and this road is like rural,
45:36
Speaker 3: so the chances of two vehicles going up there only
45:40
Speaker 3: one emerging. And we have a situation where George is
45:43
Speaker 3: missing but his caine is left behind. This isn't a
45:47
Speaker 3: man who is extremely mobile without his cain and they
45:51
Speaker 3: search the surrounding area, So you'd have to believe that
45:54
Speaker 3: he would have exhausted or would have laid down somewhere
45:58
Speaker 3: that he could have been found, whether alive or deceased,
46:01
Speaker 3: by the searchers. But as Robin mentioned, there have been
46:05
Speaker 3: plenty of cases where you do have a lot of
46:07
Speaker 3: search parties going through the area and then they find
46:10
Speaker 3: the victims years later. Didn't that happen with the Jamison family.
46:15
Speaker 1: Yes, Like they were missing for technically four years, and
46:18
Speaker 1: then they found the remains on a path that was
46:20
Speaker 1: only a couple miles from their abandoned vehicle, and even
46:23
Speaker 1: though there was a very extensive search effort, the remains
46:25
Speaker 1: had just been missed that entire time. So yeah, I've
46:28
Speaker 1: always been haunted since I watched this case in Unsolved
46:30
Speaker 1: Mysteries over thirty years ago, and I stink from a
46:33
Speaker 1: production standpoint, the reenactments of George wandering disoriented in the
46:37
Speaker 1: market are some of the most heartbreaking moments on the show,
46:40
Speaker 1: because you can totally believe this is exactly what happened
46:43
Speaker 1: to George, that he was just living an ordinary day
46:46
Speaker 1: planning to pick up his wife, but then just something
46:48
Speaker 1: snapped in him. He suffered some sort of medical issue
46:51
Speaker 1: which caused him to become confused, and when he couldn't
46:53
Speaker 1: find a lean when he thought he was supposed to
46:55
Speaker 1: pick her up, he just started driving around aimlessly until
46:58
Speaker 1: he got lost and then ultimately wound up on this
47:00
Speaker 1: remote hilltop in rural Tennessee. I mean, Okham's razor does
47:04
Speaker 1: tell me that George probably wandered into the woods and
47:07
Speaker 1: died of exposure, and they just didn't find his remains.
47:10
Speaker 1: But like we reiterated, the two details which may pointwards
47:14
Speaker 1: something more sinister is him leaving his cane behind and
47:17
Speaker 1: also the presence of the unidentified pickup truck. And it's
47:21
Speaker 1: definitely a terrible scenario that someone would target this harmless
47:25
Speaker 1: elderly man, possibly for hate crime, possibly simply because he
47:29
Speaker 1: was black. But until we find a body or any
47:31
Speaker 1: evidence to suggest what happened, then this is going to
47:34
Speaker 1: remain an unsolved mystery. But of course, the best case
47:37
Speaker 1: scenario is that someone did find George, wandered around dis
47:41
Speaker 1: oriented and gave him a good home, put him in
47:43
Speaker 1: a long term care facility. But because they couldn't identify him.
47:46
Speaker 1: He just lived the remainder of his days as a
47:49
Speaker 1: John Doe and then died a peaceful death inside his
47:51
Speaker 1: own bed. I mean, the chances of that happening are
47:55
Speaker 1: very slim because he went missing from such a remote area,
47:58
Speaker 1: but this was the pre internet world of nineteen eighty five,
48:01
Speaker 1: and it would be possible for things like that to
48:03
Speaker 1: slip through the crack, and it would definitely be a
48:05
Speaker 1: best case scenario if they were able to prove that
48:07
Speaker 1: with DNA testing, But until then, this will definitely remain
48:11
Speaker 1: one of the saddest mysteries we've ever covered on our podcast.
48:15
Speaker 1: So that about brings an end to this month's bonus
48:17
Speaker 1: Patreon minisode. Thank you so much for your support, and
48:20
Speaker 1: we'll be back again next month to provide you with
48:22
Speaker 1: another bonus minnisode.