NCMEC’s newest oldest case

The NCMEC has profiled the disappearance of Beverly Sharpman from the 1940s. Her listed missing date of September 11, 1949 beats Ricky Jean Bryant by several months, making Beverly the newest oldest case. (The NCMEC also has a 1947 case on there, but it’s a Maryland Center for Missing Children case, not an NCMEC case, so he doesn’t count in my mind.)

However their date of disappearance for Beverly is, I’m pretty sure, wrong. I have it as 1947 and I checked the Philadelphia Daily News article to be sure. If she disappeared in 1949, she would have been over 18, making her ineligible for an NCMEC listing. I have written the NCMEC about this. The date of birth differs from mine too, but I’m prepared to accept theirs.

If Beverly is still alive, she would be 79 or 80 years old today, depending on whether you accept the NCMEC’s date of birth or mine. There’s no real reason to believe she didn’t live for a long time after her disappearance; she could be a grandmother in a nursing home today, or she could have had a long life followed by a natural death. Inquiring minds would like to confirm this, however.

Article about Pat Fisk case

I found this article about the mysterious 1956 disappearance of Pat Fisk, a New Zealand father of five. His wife was pregnant with the last one when he went missing. She is still alive, but in her eighties, and she hopes for answers in her husband’s disappearance.

I’m mentioning this mainly because Pat Fisk was the first person profiled in Without Trace: On the Trail of New Zealand Missing Persons, which I reviewed here last week. It was actually the author of that book that got the police to re-open the disappearance. Back in 1956 the authorities concluded Fisk had left on his own. But more recent investigation indicates he was murdered.