Chalkboard Thoughts

      Most of my blog posts have been about murders in Indiana. I have been putting together detailed timelines and maps and submitting tips to cold case investigators in Indiana. I’ll continue doing that work but I became intensely interested in Ohio in the 1970’s. Indiana was not alone in terms of violent crime.    Linda Dyer was 15. She lived at 1720 Waltham Avenue, North College Hill, Cincinnati, Ohio. But, in the weeks before her death she was living at her friend Ernestine’s house.    On August 21st 1976 Linda wanted to go to a party but Ernestine didn’t feel like going.  Linda went anyway and later left the party alone. She hitched a ride.    She was found stabbed and strangled three days later northwest of Cincinnati in rural Colerain Township on August 24th, 1976. Dental records and an X-ray of her skull helped identify her remains.    Before her remains could be identified; Dorothy Sullivan’s body ...

       A body was found in the overgrowth off Silverville-Owensburg Road in Northeast Lawrence County in May 1976. It appeared to be a male college student. He wore blue jeans, a red sweatshirt, Adidas tennis shoes. He had been stabbed to death. His wallet was missing.  He had a set of keys though. Inside his clothes were laundry tags that had the name Bennett Brown.     Today I-69 runs through the area but it wasn’t there in 1976. This was as out of the way as you could get.      Local police were first trying to find this young man’s family.  Where was he from?     A local master locksmith was asked to take a look at the keys. He was able to identify several of the keys and their most common uses.  One key was most likely a dorm room key.     They began calling colleges nearby like Indiana University and then widening that circle.  Finally they found a Bennett B...

         Darlene Lola Procter Lausman was born on the 9th of November in 1945. (Find a Grave says her birthday was in September but her death certificate says November.) She was the oldest of her siblings. In the 1950 census her family lived at 1021 Farrand Ave. in La Porte, Indiana. I found her photos in 1963 and 1964 Ellston Senior High yearbooks from Michigan City, Indiana. She married Carl William Lausman in 1970.  He had a son from a previous marriage. Darlene and Carl Lausman lived at 920 ½ Lincolnway.         On October 19th, 1974 Darlene Lausman was at the Golden Lion Tavern on Michigan Ave. in LaPorte, Indiana. Witnesses said that Joseph Pointon left with her.  There’s nothing in the paper about whether she left willingly or if she was sober enough to consent.    She was found the next morning just before 6 a.m. by a motorist at Jefferson Ave. near Boyd. She had been raped and stabbed ...

    Mary Ellen Doll was born on the 19th of May in 1948 to Kenneth and Irene Doll. She grew up in Wanatah, Indiana. (Wanatah is southwest of LaPorte, Indiana.) She had three sisters and two brothers. She graduated from South Central High School and went on to graduate from Ball State University. She became a teacher.   She lived on Route 1 Wanatah Indiana in 1974. She had been a 26 year old Home Economics teacher at Benjamin Franklin Junior High School in Valparaiso. She had resigned after the 1971-1972 school year in order to take a teaching post for a while in Frankfort, Germany.  It was an opportunity that she could not pass up. What an exciting time in Europe that must have been for her. Then she returned back to Indiana to her parent’s home. She had gone back to Ball State to work on a Master’s degree but was home for the Summer.   On Monday, July 22nd 1974 she had driven to Michigan from Wanatah to visit family and had some car trouble whi...