A large-scale search for a missing Pocatello woman took place in 1952. Her disappearance left authorities ‘baffled’
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IDAHO FALLS — A Pocatello woman in her early 70s vanished in 1952, and the search to find her was “the most intensive and wide-spread hunt for a missing person in the annals of Bannock County” at that time.
The story on Ina Greene was featured in our weekly Looking Back feature, which looks back on what life was like during different periods in east Idaho history.
Greene reported missing
Greene, a widow and retired bank employee, was last seen walking up City Creek Canyon on the afternoon of Oct. 31, 1952. It’s not clear who reported her disappearance, but after Greene failed to return home, a search got underway the following day.
“Did she walk up into the hills, collapse in some out of the way spot and die? Did she fall into the Portneuf River and drown?” the Idaho State Journal wrote.
The Journal continued, “Was she the victim of foul play at the hands of someone who would risk murder to get the three diamond rings valued at several hundred dollars, she wore? Or, did she tire of life in Pocatello and without a word to relatives leave for another city where she lives today in solitude, cut off from her past?”
Search for Greene gets underway, handkerchief found
About 200 Boy Scouts began searching for Greene in City Creek Canyon, the Idaho Falls Post Register reported on Nov. 4, 1952. The Scouts and other searchers found a handkerchief Sunday (Greene disappeared on Friday, two days earlier), which was identified as the missing woman’s.
“The handkerchief was found near a stock watering trough in the North Fork of City Creek Canyon,” an article by The Associated Press and shared by the Nampa Idaho Free Press explained. “Mrs. W.P. Fleming identified the handkerchief as belonging to her sister, Mrs. Ina Greene.”
The handkerchief, along with footprints, which officers traced six miles into the hills, were the only clues ever found, according to the Journal.
Relatives described Greene as being in “excellent health,” that she could walk for miles without seeming to get tired and that “her solitary figure” was often seen walking up into the hills west of the city.
People who claim they have ‘peculiar powers’ come forth
“A vision is better than nothing.”
The Journal mentioned that “as usual in cases of this sort, bizarre touches were added by publicity seekers claiming peculiar powers” that would help in finding Greene.
Curtis Gibson, 37, of Utah, claimed he had psychic powers and said he “found” Greene “in a vision.” He believed she was alive and in La Grande, Oregon, or Baker, Oregon, inspecting horses. He guessed Greene would return home in about five days.
“We haven’t had any luck, so a vision is better than nothing,” Deputy James L. Johnson stated.
An Inkom woman claimed she could find Greene’s body in the Portneuf River with her divining rod. She did not want her name mentioned “unless she was successful,” explaining that this was the first time she’d try to locate a human with her divining rod.
Nearly a month after Greene disappeared, and with no success finding her, Sheriff Marley called off the search on Nov. 24, 1952.
“We’ve exhausted all possibilities so far, and we just don’t know what to do,” he said.
Deputies excavate woman’s home, find nothing
The following summer, on July 23, 1953, the Idaho State Journal said sheriff’s deputies disclosed they had been excavating in their spare time around Greene’s home.
“A woman who passes Mrs. Greene’s home every day on the way to work told sheriff’s officers she noticed an unpleasant odor,” the Journal’s article reads. “She said she wondered if Mrs. Greene might have met foul play and her body had been concealed.”
Deputy Branson said they excavated under the driveway “where it appeared the earth might have been removed and replaced,” and they dug into “several similar places in the vacant lot.”
“We searched into the sewer pipes under the manhole covers and went over every inch of Mrs. Greene’s basement looking for evidence of new cement in the walls or floor where a body might have been buried,” he said.
Branson said they didn’t find anything. Information on her disappearance was sent to the Missing Persons Bureau in Washington, D.C., but no trace of her had been found.
Where things stand
The Idaho State Journal reported on Nov. 1, 1954, that Greene “was never found and authorities are as baffled now as they were then.”
“The folder on the case has long since been … ‘inactive’ and filed away,” the Journal said in 1954. “But chief of detectives Glenn Hadley still keeps at the bottom of a file basket on his desk a copy of a missing persons flier on Mrs. Greene, given national circulation at the height of the search.”
The article continues, “It’s now a tattered and yellowed reminder of the strangest missing person case police here ever faced.”
Those who searched for Greene included hundreds of deputy sheriffs, police officers, volunteers and Boy Scouts on foot, horseback, a jeep, boat and airplane. Bloodhounds were even brought in from Montana and used in the search.
Deputy Sheriff Earl Cutler thought there was a chance Greene was still alive, but Police Chief A.L. Oliver and retired Chief of Detectives Guy Nelson were less optimistic.
“It’s always been my theory that Mrs. Greene is in the foothills west of town. All the evidence showed she had in the past walked up there numerous times,” Nelson said. “I honestly believe her body’s lying up there in some secluded spot. It was cold that night and she might have crawled under some brush to keep warm and died there.”
Greene’s relatives were also at a loss.
“You know as much about it as I do,” said Greene’s stepson, George A. Greene. “I don’t know a bit more now than I did then.”
The only other piece of newspaper information East Idaho News found possibly regarding Greene was from an Idaho State Journal article dated Feb. 26, 1960. It was a “legal advertisement” regarding the estate of Ina N. Greene. An article from years earlier refers to the missing Greene with a different middle initial, Ina B. Greene.
However, the legal advertisement states Greene as “deceased” and the “undersigned” as Leona G. Fleming. It’s not clear if Mrs. W.P. Fleming — Greene’s sister who identified Greene’s handkerchief years prior — is Leona G. Fleming, but the article said she was appointed to manage Greene’s estate.