Into Oblivion: All The Missing Wives, part 2

They were all young, attractive, and most were dark haired...

In 1955, Andrea Lopez Phares, 20, left a town in Texas to return to her home and never was  seen again. Her car was found with a key still in it, her purse and wallet in place (but missing a large amount of money according to her husband) and the trunk mat and a blanket were gone. Her husband and his brother would both go to court charged in relation to the disappearance but neither convicted.  Her husband finally moved to Oklahoma.
 

In 1958, Carol Ann Batterman,19, left the motel where she and her brand new husband were staying to meet him and look at apartments and was never seen again. Reports of a woman struggling with two men by a local lake and strangers asking for a shovel to dig worms, yet lacking normal fishing gear, was under investigated.  Local deputies shrugged wondering what the fuss was all about when reports of clothes found just northwest of the same area a year or two later. It was a known "lover's lane" after all; apparently making it safe from murder. Despite searches, digging, and lack of activity on a savings account, the woman was never seen. Her case is still considered open by local police.
 

In 1959, Billie Schaffer, 37, drove to town to do some shopping and meet with friends and several weeks later her body is found far from home in a lonely field. Her Air Force Captain husband was in Greenland when she died but rushed back to join the search.  Her car had been found abandoned far from where she had been driving and no sign of the purchases or her purse where found. [She may also be one of string of murders where the victims were placed in hard to reach fields One was in 1953, a rancher riding in the Osage Hills of Northeast Oklahoma came across the body of a white female, 21-25 years of age, 110-125 lbs. and about 5'2".  She was unknown and unidentified. The place where she was found was not easy to get to according to locals].
 

In 1959, a young bride Virginia Moore, 19, leaves El Paso, Texas to visit relatives and apparently disappeared.
 

In 1963, a young and expectant woman disappears on a short trip in the Kansas City, Missouri area and is last seen at the side of the road.  Weeks later her slip clad body is found in a corn field, her hands severed and part of her head missing. She is six miles from where  her car was found. Patricia Willoughby,22, had been seen, possibly, being "led" or "steered" toward another vehicle, along a stretch of road.

--Marilyn A. Hudson, c2014