Silvia Pettem

In 1954, two college students were hiking along a creek outside of Boulder, Colorado, when they stumbled upon the body of a murdered young woman. Who was this woman? What had happened to her? The initial investigation turned up nothing, and the girl was buried in a local cemetery with a gravestone that read, "Jane Doe, April 1954, Age About 20 Years." Decades later, historian Silvia Pettem formed a partnership with law enforcement and forensic experts and set in motion the events that led to Jane Doe's exhumation and eventual identification, as well as the identity of her probable killer. The new Kindle version includes an Epilogue––with updated information on how the mystery finally was solved.

In Search of Justice for Jane Doe

Someone's Daughter

When loved-ones go missing, the lives of their family members are turned upside-down. As the days and months turn into years, some families are caged in by their grief, while others become proactive –– renewing police contacts, keeping up with the latest technologies, and educating themselves as they strive to become their long-term missing persons’ advocates. By inspiring hope, as well as providing answers and practical advice, The Long Term Missing: Hope and Help for Families assists families in navigating the uncharted territory they never chose to enter. Author Silvia Pettem also provides families with information to better understand how law-enforcement and related agencies work to solve missing persons cases. Along the way, she takes her readers behind the scenes, while emphasizing that every unidentified person is a missing person to someone else. With real cases, both solved and unsolved, the book also illustrates the resources available and the actions that family members, civilians, and law enforcement agencies can take to search for long-term missing persons, to identify previously unknown remains, and to bring the missing persons home. The Long Term Missing: Hope and Help for Families inspires hope and gives answers as it empowers family members of long term missing persons to be proactive and to become their missing persons’ advocates.

Hope and Help for Families

The Long Term Missing

Boulder County has captivated settlers and travelers since gold prospectors founded the town in 1859. Only in Boulder is a look at the fascinating people who make up the area's rich and historic past. Here, you'll vicariously mine for gold with Indian Jack, fight for temperance with Lena Dwight and dance to the tunes of Glenn Miller. You'll also learn of Horace and Baby Doe Tabor's elusive connection to Boulder County and visit the final resting place of outlaw Tom Horn. Acclaimed historian Silvia Pettem has been writing about Boulder and its people for decades. This selected collection of her columns brings to life some of Boulder's most memorable and unique visitors, residents, activists, artists and entrepreneurs. Each compelling character is a thread in the fabric of the Boulder we know and love today.

The County's Colorful Characters

Only in Boulder

A Sense of Time and Place : Selected Daily Camera History Columns

Boulder

Only in Boulder: The County's Colorful Characters

Journey with Silvia Pettem through Boulder's history in Boulder: A Sense of Time & Place Revisited. Watch the evolution from a frontier mining town to the "Athens of the West." Learn of murder and bootleggers in the 1920s, survive the Great Depression and follow Boulder's postwar growing pains as the city matures and residents reflect on its past. Each article is a story in itself but only a small piece of what makes Boulder the city it is today.

A Sense of Time & Place Revisited

Cases in which all investigative leads appear to be exhausted are frustrating for both investigators and victims’ families. Cold cases can range from those only a few months old to others that go back for decades. Presenting profiles and actual case histories, Cold Case Research: Resources for Unidentified, Missing and Cold Homicide Cases illustrates how investigators can successfully apply resources that will enable them to reopen and solve cases gathering dust in the file room. Today’s investigators have found that, to solve cold cases, they need to be internet savvy and make the best use of the rapidly changing methodologies of the twenty-first century, but they also have to be time travelers and open the door to the past. This volume weaves together the nearly forgotten skill sets of traditional historical researchers with the latest online tools, including TLO, a premier investigative system; and NamUs, the revolutionary database for missing persons and unidentified remains. Along with practical applications, Cold Case Research gives investigators the tools they need to save time and money and to jump-start their cold cases, while keeping others from going cold in the future. Topics discussed include: Implementing cold case units People searches and working with databases Overlooked DNA in PKU cards The plight of the missing and unknown Applying historical and geographical context Online and off-line newspaper research Public and published records The use of volunteers Contact with co-victims Cold-case review teams and information-sharing resources Taking advantage of the media Using a thinking-outside-the-box approach, this volume helps fill major gaps in traditional cold case investigation training and techniques, enabling investigators to confidently reopen and crack the mystery of cases long thought unsolvable. Silvia Pettem was quoted in a January 29, 2012 article on missing persons in the Colorado Springs Gazette.

Cold Case Research Resources for Unidentified, Missing, and Cold Homicide Cases

COLD CASE CHRONICLES tells the stories of victims -- some missing, some murdered and some with changed identities. All are true, and each are mysterious in their own ways. The cases in this nonfiction narrative date from 1910 through the 1950s and include evolutions in forensics, as well as historical context in order to view the men, women and children through the lens of time.

Murders, Mysteries, and Missing Persons from History

The Cold Case Chronicles

Over 300 photographs demonstrate how Boulder, Colorado has developed, changed, and been preserved over the past century. A chapter on the work of early area photographers is followed by a tour through an evolving cityscape of log cabins and western false-fronted buildings that becomes a flourishing

Silvia Pettem

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