Bennington Triangle

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Circulated photograph of Paula Jean Welden; clipping from missing persons flyers.

"Bennington Triangle" is a phrase coined by American author

Joseph A. Citro to denote an area of southwestern Vermont within which a number of people went missing between 1945 and 1950. This was further popularized in two books, including Shadow Child, in which Citro devoted chapters to discussion of these disappearances and various items of folklore surrounding the area. According to Citro, the area shares characteristics with the Bridgewater Triangle in Southeastern Massachusetts
.

Precisely what area is encompassed in this hypothetical "mystery triangle" is not clear, but it is purportedly centered on

industrial towns, but began declining toward the late 19th century and are now essentially ghost towns, unincorporated by an act of the Vermont General Assembly
in 1937.

According to Citro's books, stories of strange happenings had been told about Glastonbury and the surrounding area for many years, the best-known of which is probably that of the disappearance of Paula Jean Welden.

Reported disappearances

Middie Rivers (1945)

Between 1945 and 1950, five people disappeared in the area surrounding

cartridge that was found in a stream.[2] The speculation was that Rivers had leaned over and the cartridge had dropped out of his pocket into the water. Rivers was an experienced outdoorsman who was familiar with the local area.[3]

Paula Welden (1946)

FBI, but no evidence of her was ever found. Welden's disappearance was the inspiration for the 1951 novel Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson.[4]

James Tedford (1949)

James E. Tedford, a veteran, allegedly went missing on December 1, 1949, three years to the day after Welden was last seen. Tedford, a resident of the Bennington Soldiers' Home, had been in St. Albans visiting relatives and was accompanied to a local bus station, which was the last location where he was seen.[5] According to witnesses, Tedford got on the bus and was still aboard at the last stop before arriving in Bennington. Somewhere between the last stop and Bennington, he vanished. His belongings were still in the luggage rack and an open bus timetable was on his vacant seat. Tony Jinks discusses this claim, saying that "The popular conception is that he vanished into thin air while on the bus, but like many missing person stories there's a gap between when he was last seen and when he was reported missing a week or so later. Regarding Tedford's disappearance, there's enough evidence to suggest he didn’t "dematerialize,” even though no trace of him was ever found."[6]

Paul Jepson (1950)

On October 12, 1950, Paul "Buddy" Jepson, a special needs child aged 8, had accompanied his mother on an errand. She left her son unattended in the cab of their truck for about an hour while she fed some pigs. When she returned, her son was nowhere in sight. A bloodhound tracked the boy along a logging road to an intersection of backroads near a stream. Or, according to local legend, where Welden had disappeared four years earlier. [3] Search parties with high powered flashlights looked for Paul but nothing was ever found. His father shared with press how easily it would be to overlook him, because his brown and tan clothing blended in with the fall leaves.

Frieda Langer (1950)

On October 28, 1950, sixteen days after Jepson had vanished, Frieda Langer, aged 53, and her cousin, Herbert Elsner, left their family campsite near the Somerset Reservoir to go on a hike. During the journey, Langer slipped and fell into a stream. She told Elsner if he would wait, she would go back to the campsite, change clothes and catch up to him. When she did not return, Elsner made his way back to the campsite and discovered that Frieda Langer had not returned, and that nobody had seen her since they had left. Over the next two weeks, five searches were conducted, involving aircraft, helicopters, and up to 300 searchers. No trace of Langer was found during the search.

On May 12, 1951, Frieda Langer's body was found three and a half miles from the campsite in the eastern branch of the Deerfield River, an area that had been only lightly searched seven months previously.[7] No cause of death could be determined because of the condition of her remains. No direct connections have been identified that tie these cases together, other than the general geographic area and time period.[7]

In popular culture

The Bennington Triangle was discussed in Season 3, Episode 8 of the television program William Shatner's Weird or What? The episode, entitled "Mysterious Vanishings," first aired on July 23, 2012.[citation needed]

The events of 1945 to 1950 are told in episode 67 of Lore, titled "The Red Coats".[8]

The Bennington Triangle was featured as one of the haunted locations in the

paranormal TV series Most Terrifying Places in America which aired on the Travel Channel in 2018. The episode, title "Unnatural World" told the stories about the reportedly missing persons in a five-year span, and local lore of the "Bennington Monster", a Bigfoot-like creature that supposedly roams these wooded areas.[9]

The Bennington Triangle is discussed in Episode 374 of the podcast My Favorite Murder. The episode aired on April 13, 2023.[10] Robert Singley, a 27 year old Bennington College student got lost in Bennington Triangle but found safe by Vermont State Police in 2008.[11][12]

The Bennington Triangle is discussed in Episode 11, Cursed, of the podcast Scared to Death by Dan Cummins.

References

  1. ^ "The Bennington Evening Banner". 15 Nov 1945. p. 6.
  2. ^ Stone, Roberta. "Roberta Stone: Looking back on unexplained disappearances". Brattleboro Reformer. Retrieved 26 August 2022.
  3. ^ a b "Bennington Triangle – Definition". WordIQ.com. 2010. Archived from the original on 2014-03-22. Retrieved 2014-03-21.
  4. ^ "Shirley Jackson's Horror Novel 'Hangsaman' Was Inspired By A Real-Life Disappearance". Bustle. 18 October 2018. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  5. ^ "James Tedford Missing". Burlington Free Press. 1949. Retrieved 2020-06-09.
  6. ISBN 978-0-7864-9860-4
    . Retrieved 24 December 2022.
  7. ^ a b Dooling, Michael C. Clueless in New England: The Unsolved Disappearances of Paula Welden, Connie Smith and Katherine Hull. The Carrollton Press, 2010. [ISBN missing][page needed]
  8. ^ Mahnke, Aaron (21 August 2017). "Episode 67: The Red Coats". Lore Podcast. Retrieved 3 November 2017.
  9. ^ "Unnatural World". Travel Channel. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  10. ^ https://myfavoritemurder.com/374-emotional-money-booth/
  11. ^ "Bennington Banner 03 Oct 2008, page 21".
  12. ^ "Bennington Banner 03 Oct 2008, page 23".

Further reading

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