The search never ends and the goal never changes.
If you were to discuss his ongoing quest to help law enforcement locate and identify those unfortunate souls who go missing and unidentified each and every day, in this country and around the world, this is the mantra Todd Matthews would give you. Matthews, the proverbial "man on a mission" and co-founder of The Doe Network, has been on a decades-long hunt, searching for those missing pieces of information which can help give names to the nameless and locate the missing.
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| Tent Girl (photo courtesy of Todd Matthews) |
Tent Girl - Where the Hunt Began
Todd will gladly tell you where it all began, this ceaseless hunt for clues, for information. He'll give you the name. It's not an actual name, per se, but a nickname; a nickname which comes with an amazing story of perseverance rewarded.
May 17th, 1968 was the day the body was discovered. It was that of a girl who had been brutally murdered, her body discarded on the side of a country road in the state of Kentucky, unceremoniously wrapped up, like so much trash, in a tarp. She had no known identity at the time she was found, but would soon be given the simple nickname of Tent Girl, as it appeared that the material she had been stuffed into resembled something you would use to wrap up a tent. Todd Matthew's future father in law, Wilbur Riddle, had made the unexpected and grisly discovery of her lifeless, decomposing body wrapped in the heavy green canvas tarp and it was he who helped relate the story of discovering her to Todd. It was a tale of an "everyday day", which was turned entirely upside down and made sadly memorable by a discovery too horrifying and gruesome to be believed. As he listened, Todd found himself transfixed by what Riddle told him and soon after, he began to feel an unshakeable urge to do something to help this unknown girl regain her true name and identity. He decided then and there that he would begin to search for Tent Girl, to discover who she really was.
It began as a part-time interest but soon consumed him. He worked tirelessly, as the days turned into weeks, the months into years. With only desire and drive as his constant companions during this solitary journey, Todd was relentless, visiting libraries, scouring newspaper articles, searching for unidentified murder victims and missing persons who might just fit the description of the unknown woman in the canvas tarp. When he eventually ran out of traditional options, he turned to an evolving technology called the internet to see if he could discover more. Against incredible odds, Todd Matthews found his needle in the haystack; an appeal for help posted on an internet message board, a family searching for their lost daughter who had gone missing. Upon contacting the family, Todd soon verified that the girl they were searching for was the same girl Wilbur Riddle had discovered that day on the side of the road, wrapped in the canvas tarp. It was a terribly bittersweet success, but it helped to reunite Tent Girl with her family, her identity and her name, Barbara Ann Hackmann.
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| Barbara Ann Hackmann (photo courtesy of Todd Matthews) |
It was in those endless hours of patiently sifting through scraps of information, all in an attempt to solve a mystery he couldn't shake, that Todd Matthews found his calling.
The Fruits of his Efforts
It's been over twenty years since he helped the Hackmann family to bring their lost daughter home so they could properly lay her to rest. During that time, Todd Matthews has never stopped looking for new and innovative ways to help solve cases - both old and new - of the missing and unidentified. He started this journey years ago, creating a simple Yahoo online group which reviewed unsolved cold cases. Then, he helped co-found The Doe Network, which has now become a worldwide, all-volunteer organization which publishes a website, doenetwork.org, a searchable database of current missing and unidentified persons cases from around the world. He eventually took a job with the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs, for short), as the Director of Case Management and Communications. Over the years, he's done countless interviews, for television and print publications. He's been on the radio. He's done podcasts. All in the name of helping to spread the word, to see if he can help find just one more missing person, help solve just one more case. His near constant involvement in the work has made him into a Pied Piper-like figure of sorts for the missing and unidentified. It's as if their souls follow him and trust that he will help them to find their way home and give them rest.
The Living Memory
Todd Matthews now has a new project which involves a phrase he's been using for many years.
Everything that is known about someone who has gone missing or unidentified is recorded somewhere. Whether it's in a police report, a newspaper or magazine article, a television program or internet site or in someone's memory, it's a piece of information about that person that exists. What's important to Todd is that this information may hold clues as to what happened to cause a person to go missing or for a body to be unidentified. These bits and pieces of information are what Todd likes to call, "The Living Memory". The way he sees it, part of his work is to locate that information - before it is too late to be retrieved.
Information is like anything else - it can disappear. As time goes by, files and documents can get lost or destroyed. Websites and databases close or get shut down, memories fade. Todd knows just how important it is to catalogue and utilize these precious living memories before they are no longer available, for whatever reason. They may be the last hope for bringing some type of closure to a life cut short, or a person who has mysteriously disappeared. As Todd often says, "once the living memory is gone, it can be too late to recover details that can solve a case."
The Unidentified Unidentified
Over the years, Todd has spent countless hours digging through whatever memories he can find about these cases. Along the way, he's learned all too well that time is of the essence when locating information regarding stories of older John, Jane and Baby Doe's. He's seen the cases which, under more normal circumstances would have a realistic chance of being solved, go ice cold because the records no longer exist. Given enough time, this lack of any discernable evidence trail can literally erase the case and render it virtually unsolvable, save for some sort of miracle. When a case gets to this point, it can very easily be forgotten, as there is literally no one or nothing to keep that living memory alive.
"There are bodies literally right under our noses that we don't know about or we have forgotten about."
Matthews is now looking to create a database of memories of these forgotten cases. The "Unidentified Unidentified" as he refers to them. Memories of people who no longer have names, who were murdered or disappeared for unknown reasons and were never identified, save for the generic, "Unidentified" marker on their file. He's looking to match those unidentified people with the names of family members who simply disappeared one day, never to return home to their families, to loved ones and children who still hope for a miracle, or simply wait to find out what happened to them.
Much of what Todd is looking for will ultimately be found, he believes, in old newspaper articles. Believe it or not, there was a time in the not too distant past, before the rise of the internet, when newspapers were the primary source of information about so many things that were happening in communities across the nation, including stories about people who went missing or who were discovered yet unidentified. It's in these long forgotten articles that Todd believes many unsolved cases can be rediscovered and in some cases, even solved.
Ultimately, Todd is looking to create a digital, online archive of these newspaper articles, in an attempt to preserve as much of the living memory of any cases that can be found. The goal is to then breath new life into long dormant cases with the information within these newspaper articles, using any and all appropriate media outlets that he can partner with.
Todd isn't just speculating on the importance of these old newspaper articles - he's seen firsthand the power they have to be the start of amazing success stories.
Pecos Jane Doe
It was just a small news article. All but forgotten, in a small, local daily newspaper from an even smaller town named Pecos, Texas. When Todd received the email at The Doe Network, he was also working for NamUs, as Director of Communications. The pertinent details from within the news article had been emailed to him by someone in the Netherlands. She said she was hopeful it might be used to help advance the case of an unidentified woman, a victim of an apparent drowning at a motel in that small Texas town.
The date was May 5th, 1966. The location was the Ropers Motel at 1200 East Third St. The unknown woman, 5' 4 1/2", 130 lbs., aged between 17 and 20, with long brown hair and eyes, had checked into the Ropers Motel in Pecos, Texas with a man who, it appeared, was her husband. At least, that's what it said on the registration card they filled out at the front desk. After settling in to their room, the email continued, they were seen swimming in the motel pool, which was situated within a privacy wall enclosure on the east side of the motel complex.
When the cries for help were heard, at approximately 5:30 pm, people from the motel rushed to the pool area and pulled the unknown drowning woman out of the water. Sadly, despite all attempts at resuscitation, the young woman never regained consciousness and was pronounced dead on arrival at the local hospital.
Confronted with the news of her tragic demise, her husband promptly went back to their room, packed up everything and left. He was never seen or heard from again. The only thing left was the name which the couple had used to register, Mr. and Mrs. Russell Battoun.
On January 19th, 2021, more than half a century after she drowned, the young woman was given back her name - Jolaine Hemmy. She was only seventeen when she went missing from the town of Salina, Kansas after working a shift at a local fast food restaurant.
Looking Back - Looking Forward
Todd Matthews is now looking back on the time he has spent working to give voices to those who can no longer speak for themselves. It's been work that has challenged, frustrated, rewarded and honored him. He has partnered with some amazing people and organizations, pushing the envelope to help get many cases the attention they have needed, that they have deserved. The work hasn't always been easy and it is far from finished.
As Todd told me, there have been times he "Had to kick out a wall to make a door."
I have no doubt there are many souls smiling down on Todd Matthews as he continues to kick out more walls.
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If you have old newspaper articles regarding cases of missing and or unidentified persons and you would like to submit copies of them to Todd, you can do so by emailing him at:
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