How can someone disappear from a hospital, you ask? Good question! Strange story ahead!
The Disappearance Of Joan Gay Croft
Whenever a natural disaster occurs, it’s almost inevitable that some victims will never be found. However, the disappearance of four-year-old Joan Gay Croft is unlike any other.
On April 9, 1947, an F5 tornado ravaged its way through Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, causing hundreds of deaths and devastating several towns. One of these towns was Woodward, Oklahoma, where 185 people were killed and many more injured. Joan Gay Croft lived in Woodward and wound up losing her mother that day. Joan’s stepfather was critically injured, and both Joan and her eight-year-old half sister, Jerri, suffered minor injuries. The two girls were taken to the local hospital to stay in the basement, which was being used as a shelter for refugees.
Sometime during the night, two unidentified men dressed in khaki army uniforms entered the basement and grabbed Joan. When Joan protested that she didn’t want to leave her sister, the two men assured her everything would be okay and that they would return for Jerri. Hospital staff members confronted the men, but they claimed they were taking Joan to another hospital to see her family. The two men were allowed to leave with Joan but did not return for Jerri. Joan was never seen again. Strangely, the men had specifically asked for Joan when they entered the room, indicating that they knew her.
The case received national mainstream attention over the next several decades, but Joan was never located. In 1999, a newspaper editor for The Oklahoman received an e-mail from a woman claiming to be Joan Gay Croft, who said she had been living under a different name with her family’s knowledge. The woman agreed to a meeting but ceased communications and never came forward. Joan Gay Croft’s disappearance remains unsolved and is one of the most unusual child abductions on record.
This story is especially sad to me. I can't imagine why the hospital would allow someone to just come and walk off with a child without a note from the parents...or some kind of authorization, can you?
Coffee out on the patio again today. Brother, it's hot and humid!
