These disappearances have baffled analysts and remain unexplained to this day.
With the rapid development of technology and modern equipment, police today can track down fugitive criminals or missing persons. However, this was not the case in the past; there were many instances of people disappearing mysteriously, leaving authorities baffled…
Let’s take a look back at some of the most mysterious disappearances in history, as compiled by Cracked below.
1. Theater mogul Ambrose Small
The first case concerns the Canadian theater tycoon Ambrose Small. Living in the early decades of the 20th century, this man was famous for owning most of the theaters in Eastern Canada.
He had an enviable life with a well-off wife – who inherited a brewery from her father. However, Ambrose Small’s personality was far from pleasant; he was addicted to gambling, womanizing, and prejudiced against the poor.
Portrait of the Canadian theater mogul of the first half of the 20th century
In 1919, Ambrose made a puzzling decision: he sold all his assets and received $1.7 million (approximately 34 billion VND at current exchange rates). After this, he suddenly disappeared without a trace. Strangely, the money remained intact, showing no signs of being stolen.
Although he disappeared on December 2, 1919, the mysterious disappearance of Ambrose Small was not discovered until much later. The cause is believed to stem from the millionaire’s philandering ways, as he had previously disappeared for days at a time to be with his mistresses. Therefore, his wife, Theresa Small, only officially filed a missing person report with the police on January 3, 1920, quite some time after the incident occurred.
Grand Opera House (Toronto) – a theater formerly owned by Ambrose Small
Ambrose’s wife became the prime suspect, but due to a lack of evidence, she was proven innocent. In their efforts to find the theater mogul, Canadian police sought the help of psychics, but to no avail.
Upon launching their investigation, police initially confirmed that Small had no motive for disappearing. Furthermore, the millionaire had no money with him, nor any ransom note, let alone any evidence of kidnapping.
Theresa Small then offered a $50,000 reward for anyone with information about her husband’s disappearance and whereabouts if he was alive, and $15,000 if he was dead. Despite this, no one claimed the reward.
At the time, police also discovered that in the two weeks before Ambrose was reported missing, his close aide, John Doughty, had also disappeared and had even gone to the millionaire’s office twice to steal checks worth $150,000 on the very day Ambrose disappeared. However, this aide was ultimately only convicted of theft and found no evidence linking him to Ambrose Small’s disappearance.
Missing person notice for Ambrose Small.
With no news, no trace, and no information whatsoever, the disappearance of this millionaire reached an unbelievable dead end. Furthermore, many theories were put forward regarding the millionaire’s disappearance, such as that he was murdered by his wife and burned in the furnace at the Grand Theatre, or that the police assisted the millionaire in his disappearance, but none of these were verified.
In 1924, five years after Ambrose Small disappeared, he was declared dead. The case remained unsolved until it was finally closed in 1960 with the hypothesis that he had lost his memory and gone into hiding. As for Ambrose’s money, it was all donated to the church.
Even now, more than 100 years later, the disappearance of Ambrose Small without a trace remains one of Canada’s most shocking events.
2. Judge Joseph Force Crater
Joseph Force Crater was a prominent judge in New York during the 1930s. He served on the New York Supreme Court and was highly regarded by Franklin D. Roosevelt (who later became the US president).
However, Joseph mysteriously disappeared at the height of his career. In late July 1930, after a summer vacation with his wife in Belgrade, Joseph received a strange phone call without telling his wife the content.
He then traveled to the Atlantic with his mistress, Sally Lou Ritz. He informed his wife that he would be returning to New York to handle business and promised to be home on her birthday, August 9th.
Things didn’t go as planned. On the morning of August 6th, Joseph spent two hours in his courthouse office, then withdrew $70,777 from his personal funds. That evening, after attending a show at the Belasco Theatre and having dinner with some friends, he suddenly disappeared.
Joseph Force Crater’s wife and a missing husband notice.
But strangely, it wasn’t until 10 days after Joseph disappeared that his wife discovered his disappearance and reported it to the police. With no trace and no evidence, the case was officially closed.
No one knows whether Joseph Force Crater is still alive or dead, so New Yorkers call him “The Missingest Man in New York.”
3. Female pilot Amelia Earhart
Mention Amelia Earhart, and the world will immediately remember her as one of the most talented female pilots in the world. She was the first recipient of the United States’ Distinguished Flying Cross, recognizing her as the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. Not only that, she was also a writer and a leading figure in the American women’s pilot organization, The Ninety-Nines.
With her adventurous and daring nature, in 1937 Amelia declared she would fly around the Earth in a Lockheed Model 10 Electra. True to her word, the female pilot began her journey that same year. However, she disappeared while flying over the central Pacific Ocean, near Howland Island.
Suspecting she had perished, the American authorities spent considerable effort and money searching for her body and the plane. However, all efforts were in vain, not even the slightest trace was found. In 1939, Amelia Earhart was officially declared dead.
After the flight, no one ever had the chance to see Amelia Earhart again.
In December 2010, Amelia’s story resurfaced when a group of university students found the remains of a young woman on Nikumaroro Island (Phoenix, Kiribati). DNA testing was conducted, but they were still not certain whether it was the famous Amelia Earhart. Therefore, Amelia’s whereabouts remain a mystery.
4. Air Force lieutenant “disappears” in mid-air.
In 1953, Lieutenant Felix Moncla was stationed at Kinross Air Force Base in Michigan. During a shift, Moncla observed an unidentified flying object (UFO) appearing on radar.
Shortly afterward, he piloted an F-89 Scorpion interceptor to investigate the incident.
Lieutenant Felix Moncla and the image allegedly showing a UFO.
Ground-based radar observed Moncla’s plane flying at 800 km/h, heading straight towards the unidentified object. As it approached the target, both the plane and the UFO suddenly vanished.
A rescue team was dispatched to search for Moncla, however they confirmed they found no signs of a collision or debris.
Moncla and his plane have not yet been found.
5. Ghost Passengers on the MV Joyita
Like the Titanic, the MV Joyita was touted as unsinkable. However, this was shattered when, in 1955, the ship capsized and sank en route from Fiji to Vanua Levu.
All 25 passengers and crew members mysteriously disappeared.
Much later, the ship was found in the South Pacific. Four tons of cargo, along with medical supplies, wood, and food, had all vanished without a trace.
It was also discovered that all the lifeboats had disappeared, and blood-stained bandages were found.
The MV Joyita was later found.
Scientist David Wright suggests that a pipe on the ship had corroded, causing it to gradually sink. This acted like a ticking time bomb, triggering the accident.
David believes that because there wasn’t enough room on the boat, some people swam along wearing life vests. One by one, they died from drowning or being eaten by sharks.
However, the disappearance of the people on the boat remains unexplained to this day.
6. Pilot disappears with UFO.
The disappearance of Frederick Valentich caused a sensation due to the discovery of a disturbing audio recording. Frederick Valentich was known as a light aircraft pilot.
In 1978, while en route to King Island, Australia, Frederick reported seeing a UFO above him, approximately 300 meters from the plane.
Specifically, Frederick said: ” A strange plane is hovering above me again. It’s hovering, and it’s not a plane.”
Pilot Frederick Valentinch.
Shortly afterward, his plane began malfunctioning and disappeared from radar. Examination of the audio recordings revealed metallic noises in the final 17 seconds that analysts could not explain.
Also that week, around 10 UFO sightings were sent to the Royal Australian Air Force.
7. The hijacker “vanished” from the sky.
DB Copper is the name people gave to the most famous hijacker of all time.
On November 24, 1971, this unidentified man hijacked a Boeing 727 while it was flying between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington.
He demanded a ransom of $200,000. After receiving the money, Copper parachuted out of the plane without a trace.
The hijacker’s nickname was DB Copper.
Many theories have been put forward, but none have been substantiated. Until recently, a girl reported that on the night of the abduction, she saw her uncle, Copper, severely injured.
She provided her uncle’s fingerprints from the guitar. However, the fingerprint analysis has not yet convincingly proven that this was the person who hijacked the mysterious plane.
8. Mysterious Disappearances in the Bennington Triangle
The Bennington Triangle is an area in southwestern Vermont (northeast United States) surrounded by Glastenbury Mountain. It is also the site of a series of mysterious disappearances over a 30-year period, from 1920 to 1950.
A location within the Bennington Triangle.
On December 1, 1949, former soldier James Tetford reportedly disappeared from a crowded bus on Albans Road. Fourteen other passengers testified that Tetford had fallen asleep and then suddenly vanished as the bus reached its final stop. A lengthy investigation was launched, but the man’s whereabouts remain a mystery.
On December 1, 1946, 19-year-old Paula Welden disappeared while out for a walk. She was last seen falling and rolling down the Long Trail on Glastenbury Mountain. An investigation revealed nothing unusual.
In October 1946, eight-year-old Paul Jepson disappeared from a farm. Paul’s mother had left him playing near a pigsty while she tended to the animals.
After some time, she couldn’t find her child. A wide-ranging search was conducted, but without success.
These are just three of at least six unexplained disappearances that have occurred in Bennington over the past 30 years.
9. Group of people disappear at Stonehenge after being struck by lightning.
A group of hippers held a ceremony celebrating the cycle of the universe in 1970 at the famous Stonehenge site .
They spent the night there, building a campfire and smoking marijuana. Around 2 a.m., a thunderstorm struck the Salisbury Plains.
A ceremony celebrating the cosmic cycle was held in 1970 at Stonehenge.
A farmer and a police officer said they witnessed lightning striking the Stonehenge stones, causing the entire circle to be bathed in a dazzling blue light.
Then they ran to the scene, thinking the hippers might be dead. However, when they arrived, they found no one, even though they had heard very loud screams earlier.
Almost no further information is available about this mysterious incident.
10. The disappearance of flight MH370: The biggest mystery of the 21st century.
On March 8, 2014, Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia, to Beijing Capital International Airport, China.
Many theories have been put forward, including conspiracy theories. However, these theories lack concrete evidence, and the mystery remains unsolved.
This image is allegedly of MH370.
What we know so far is that some of the aircraft’s transceivers were manually switched off, and the flights changed direction drastically.
During this time, there were no calls from passengers or crew, nor any signals sent by the pilots. The wreckage of the plane has not yet been found.
11. The mysterious disappearance of an entire village
In 1930, on a cold night, Canadian fur trader Joe Labelle was shocked to discover that the Inuit village near Lake Anjikuni had vanished without a trace.
All that remained were huts with large quantities of clothing and food (proving that the people hadn’t abandoned them voluntarily), a graveyard with a few excavated and cleared graves, and a pack of sled dogs buried under the snow and starved to death.
The people of the Inuit village disappeared overnight.
Labelle subsequently reported the incident to the police, but investigations into the disappearance of the entire village of over 2,000 people yielded no results.
Even stranger, on the night the village disappeared, someone also reported seeing a blue light streaking across the horizon.
Some people doubted Labelle’s story was fabricated. Others pointed out that it was similar to a story in Frank Edwards’ science fiction book, ” Stranger than Science .”
12. The 9th Roman Legion – A proud army that vanished without a trace.
By the 2nd century AD, the 9th Legion (Legio IX Hispana) had become one of the most formidable armies in Roman military history.
Founded around 65 BC, the 9th Legion, comprised of over 4,000 of the bravest and most valiant warriors, fought and achieved numerous victories in conquests from Africa and Spain to Germany and England.
The Legion of IX Hispana became one of the most fearsome armies in Roman military history. (Illustrative image).
But in 109 AD, while on an expedition in what is now Scotland, the entire elite legion mysteriously disappeared.
Most historians believe that the disappearance (due to disintegration and deaths in battle) of the elite army was not mysterious at all. However, since there is no evidence, all explanations remain legends.
One of the most widely circulated legends of the time was that an army of thousands was annihilated by valiant Scottish warriors in 117 AD.
This legend has also been the subject of numerous films, books, and television programs since. Because there is no archaeological evidence, the truth about the disappearance of the elite Roman legion has never been discovered.
13. Lost Colony – The mysterious fate of hundreds of people challenges historians and archaeologists.
Considered one of the most perplexing mass disappearances in human history, the fate of the migrants in the Lost Colony remains a perplexing puzzle for historians and archaeologists to this day.
The story goes that in 1587, 117 English migrants led by John White (1540–1593) arrived on Roanoke Island off the coast of present-day North Carolina (USA) to build a new life in the promised land.
Ironically, upon arrival, they encountered strong opposition from the locals. John White then decided to return to England to request military aid.
It was three years later, in 1590, that John White was able to return to Roanoke Island. The reality before him was astonishing: more than 100 inhabitants, men, women, and children, had vanished without a trace.
All John White found was the word “CROATOAN” carved into a tree trunk. Believing it to be a message from his people before they migrated to the nearby island of the same name, John White and the British army decided to search for it. However, sea storms thwarted his good intentions before he returned to England shortly afterward.
John White’s return means that the truth about the “disappearance” of hundreds of British migrants back then has never been clarified. Did they really migrate to another island? Or were they killed by the natives from the start? These questions have remained unanswered for over 400 years.
14. USS Cyclops – Disappeared without a trace in the deep ocean.
The USS Cyclops was one of the largest fuel ships in the U.S. Navy. It was last seen on March 4, 1918, while docked in the West Indies en route from Brazil to Baltimore, carrying 10,800 tons of manganese ore (used in ammunition production) and over 300 passengers and crew.
The USS Cyclops never reached Baltimore (a port city in Maryland, USA), because the massive ship and its 306 crew members simply vanished without a trace in the deep ocean. No one understands what happened!
Did the USS Cyclops sink due to overloading or being hit by a sea storm? It’s all a mystery! (Illustrative image).
Led by a highly experienced captain, the disappearance of the USS Cyclops was a subject of much controversy at the time.
Despite all the search efforts, day and night, the fate of the USS Cyclops remains completely shrouded in mystery to this day.
