THE FIVE SODDER CHILDREN - FAYETTVILLE, WV on 12/24/45
Betty Dolly Sodder, Maurice Antonio Sodder, Jennie Irene Sodder, Louis Erico Sodder, and Martha Lee Sodder Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance Missing Since: December 24, 1945 from Fayetteville, West Virginia Classification: Endangered Missing Age: 5 years old (Betty), 14 years old (Maurice), 8 years old (Jennie), 10 years old (Louis) and 12 years old (Martha) Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian (Italian) females/males. All had black hair, brown eyes. Details of Disappearance Betty is one of ten children and resided in Fayetteville, West Virginia with his parents at the time of her disappearance. On Christmas Eve in 1945, Betty and four of her siblings, Maurice, Martha, Louis and Jennie, asked to be allowed to stay up and play with their Christmas toys after the rest of the family went to bed. They promised they would do their chores before they went to sleep, so their parents agreed to let them stay up. Shortly after midnight, the children's mother, Jenny Sodder, was awakened by the ringing phone. When she answered, the female caller on the other end asked to speak to someone Jenny did not know, then laughed and hung up. Jenny believed this was a prank call. Before she went back to sleep, she noticed that her home's lights were on, the shades were up and the doors were unlocked. Jenny was woken up again that night by a noise on the roof. At 1:30 a.m., she realized the house was on fire. She called for her husband and children to get out. Two of the Sodders' sons and their daughter, who was carrying the baby, made it outside, but Jenny and her husband, George, realized Maurice, Martha, Louise, Jennie and Betty were missing. George tried to find a ladder which was kept near the house so he could climb up to the children's bedrooms, but the ladder had disappeared. It was later found down an embankment away from the house. The Sodder house burned to the ground less than forty-five minutes after the fire started. The fire department initially blamed the blaze on faulty wiring. Some reports stated that officials could not find any trace of the missing children's remains in the ashes, but other reports maintain that some bone fragments and possible organs were located. One suspected organ was analyzed but turned out to be beef liver. A coroner's jury ruled that the missing Sodder children had died in the fire. Within months of their children's presumed deaths, George and Jenny decided they had not been killed by the flames but had been kidnapped, and the fire deliberately set to cover the crime. The house's telephone line had been cut sometime before or after the fire. Witnesses reported sightings of the Sodder children in the area shortly after they supposedly died. The Sodders attempted to get the case reopened, but for many years the police refused to investigate because there was no evidence that a crime had been committed. In 1949, George and some others excavated the site of his former home to search for the missing children's remains. Only four pieces of vertebrae and two small bones that were possibly from a child's hand were located. A pathologist who assisted with the search remarked that it was unusual that so little was found, as the fire was quick-burning and should not have so completely destroyed the children's remains. The pathologist believed the bones that were located were from a 14- to 15-year-old, which would match Maurice's age, but due to the location that the bones were found in the floor plan of the house. George did not believe they were from his son. Another analysis conducted years later determined that the bones were from a 16- to 22-year-old person. Curiously, the bones did not have any signs of fire damage. It was suggested that they were planted at the site from a nearby cemetery, but there is no evidence to support this theory. Jenny and George searched for their children for the rest of their lives, posting a billboard advertising a reward for their safe return. George died in 1969 and Jenny in 1989. Many people theorize that the missing children were killed in the fire and their parenst were unable to accept the loss, but others believe the children were indeed abducted and were possibly taken to Italy. The youngest Sodder child, who was an infant at the time of the fire, is still trying to determine what happened to her brothers and sisters. Investigating Agency If you have any information concerning this case, please contact: Fayetteville Police Department 304-574-0255 PHOTOS AVAILABLE AT LINKS http://charleyproject.org/cases/s/sodder_betty.html http://charleyproject.org/cases/s/sodder_jennie.html http://charleyproject.org/cases/s/sodder_louis.html http://charleyproject.org/cases/s/sodder_martha.html http://charleyproject.org/cases/s/sodder_maurice.html

The Sodder children's website: http://www.sodderchildren.com/

Mystery of Missing Children Haunts W.Va. Town The Missing Sodder Children Five of the Sodder children, ranging in age from 5 to 14, died or went missing early Christmas morning in 1945: All Things Considered, December 23, 2005 · Other than music that plays from a loudspeaker mounted on a storefront in the center of town, the streets of Fayetteville, W.V., are quiet as Christmas Eve approaches. Inside, they talk of presents and parties, and inevitably, what really happened to the Sodder family on Christmas morning 60 years ago. Everyone has an opinion about the fire. These are the facts: When George and Jennie Sodder went to sleep on Christmas Eve in 1945, nine of their 10 children were with them. One son was away in the military. George Bragg, a local writer and author of West Virginia Unsolved Murders, tells the story of that night's events: "Jennie woke up. She heard a noise. Somebody had thrown something on the roof. She got up and checked that out, and went back to bed. She woke up about a half-hour later, and she smelled smoke. She got up and realized one of the rooms where their office was was on fire. She screamed for her husband and woke him up, and they both hollered upstairs where two of the boys were." Neighbors reached Chief F. J. Morris at the Fayetteville Fire Department a little after 1 a.m. By then, it was already Christmas. Firefighters were told that children were trapped inside, but no fire truck was sent until 8 a.m. -- seven hours later. Chief Morris is long dead. But another retired fire chief, Steve Cruikshank, tried to explain the delay. He says the fire department didn't even have a siren back then. When somebody called to report an incident, an operator would take the call and rouse a firefighter, who would then have to reach fellow firefighters one by one. The Sodder parents and four of their children escaped. But five of the Sodder children, ages 5, 8, 9, 12 and 14, were never seen again. Strange Events Surrounding That Night What happened next unfolded in such a way as to almost guarantee that the story of the Sodder fire would be forever surrounded by misinformation, wishful thinking and rumor. All that remained of the Sodder house was a basement full of ashes. A brief, informal search took place, but instead of the skeletons they expected to find, firefighters encountered just a few bones and pieces of internal organs. The family was never told that anything was found. Because it was Christmas, a more thorough search was postponed. The fire marshal told the Sodder family to leave the site as it was. He said authorities would come back and finish inspecting things later. But the father, George Sodder, ignored the fire marshal. Less than a week later, he bulldozed four or five feet of dirt onto what was left of his home. The family planted flowers, a shrine to their lost children. Two years later, George Sodder saw a newspaper photo of school children in New York and became convinced that one of the children was his missing daughter Betty. He jumped in his pickup and drove to Manhattan. Despite his insistence, he was not allowed to see the child. But Sodder became convinced that his children were still alive -- if not in New York, then somewhere else. He and his wife hired a string of private detectives to search for the children. Around the same time, Fayetteville Fire Chief Morris added a bizarre twist to the story. According to Unsolved Murders author Bragg, Morris told the Sodders that he had recovered a body part from the site of the fire and buried it in a box there. If the box of remains could be recovered, that would be proof that the children had died that night. The family could finally move on. George Sodder and a private investigator asked Morris to show them where he'd buried the box. "They got together and dug the box up," Bragg says. "They took it straight to a funeral home and asked the person in charge there to open the box and examine the interior. When he did open that box, he found what looked like a fresh beef liver." Rumors Swirl That's when newspapers got hold of the story. Strangers began reporting that they'd seen the Sodder kids around the country. None of the leads went anywhere. Today, there are no longer any traces of the 1945 fire at the former site of the Sodder house. Cars speed past a new white house at the end of a gravel driveway. A few Christmas decorations hang here and there around the house, but nothing stands out. But for decades, a huge reminder of the tragedy stood at the site: a billboard. The Sodders purchased the billboard in 1952. It featured black-and-white photographs of each missing child and an account of the fire. It also offered a $5,000 reward for information leading to the recovery of any or all of their children. For years, people would pull over and walk up to the billboard, Bragg says. "When you walked up to that sign, you were looking right into the faces of the children," he says. The billboard fed new rumors: The children had been sold to an orphanage. They were taken to Italy. Some even suggested the mafia had somehow been involved. And through it all, the Sodder family clung to hope. After all, no one had seen the children at the windows, crying for help. But that's not unusual, says West Virginia State Fire Marshall Sterling Lewis. He says that when young children feel heat and smell smoke, they are likely to hide. "We find them under beds. We find them in closets. We find them crawled up in the bathtubs," Lewis says. Hope Springs Eternal For the rest of his life, George Sodder traveled the country, tracking down rumors of his missing kids. He died in 1969, his wife, Jennie, 20 years later. After her death, the billboard came down. The youngest child who survived the fire, Sylvia Sodder Praxton, didn't want her voice recorded for NPR's story. What she did want: to fulfill her parent's wish to keep the story alive. So every Christmas, the people of Fayetteville go over what happened that night, repeating the same reasons for believing their version of the story. Without physical evidence, they can't say for sure, but fire professionals are convinced the blaze that took place in 1945 probably cost the Sodder children their lives. For some, the children died 60 years ago. For the family and many of their neighbors who grew up looking into the faces of the Sodder children, and who firmly believe the children are still out there, this could be the Christmas they finally come home. PHOTOS OF ALL CHILDREN, THE SODDER PARENTS, THE BILLBOARD THAT STOOD AT THE LOCATION OF THE FIRE FOR TWO DECADES, AND THE SITE OF THE SODDER FIRE AVAILABLE AT LINK http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5067563

The Myspace page devoted to the Sodder disappearances: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=139901334 This profile contains very interesting information, I reccomned it to anyone who is interested in the case.

WHY? On Christmas Eve, 1945, George and Jennie Sodder went to sleep not knowing that their lives were about to change forever. A few short hours later, their house was burned to the ground and five of their children were missing. No remains of the children were ever found. George and Jennie have since passed away, but the questions that would forever haunt their lives remain unanswered. This site is intended to serve as a means of sharing information about this event and is developed in remembrance of the five missing children, their siblings, and their parents, who bore the burden of all the questions and uncertainty for the rest of their lives. The Missing Children The five children who were missing on Christmas morning, 1945, were Betty (age 5), Jennie (age 8 ), Louis (age 9), Martha Lee (age 12), and Maurice (age 14). WHY? *Discussion Forum & Photo Gallery available at link* http://www.sodderchildren.com/

Betty Dolly Sodder Birth: Mar. 4, 1940 Death: Dec. 25, 1945 Jennie Irene Sodder Birth: Sep. 19, 1937 Death: Dec. 25, 1945 Louis Erico Sodder Birth: Dec. 30, 1935 Death: Dec. 25, 1945 Martha Lee Sodder Birth: Jan. 22, 1933 Death: Dec. 25, 1945 Maurice Antonio Sodder Birth: Jul. 8, 1931 Death: Dec. 25, 1945 On a cold, drizzly Christmas Eve in 1945, a modest home just outside Fayetteville, West Virginia belonging to George and Jennie Sodder was set ablaze. The Sodders and nine of their ten children were at home asleep when the fire broke out. Mrs. Sodder was awakened by the smell of smoke and quickly woke her husband and her eldest daughter, 17 year-old Marian. The three escaped the blaze, as did their eldest sons John and 16 year-old George Jr., and the youngest child, 3 year-old Sylvia. The rest of the children had been playing downstairs and were unaccounted for. By the time the local fire department arrived at 7am the next morning, there was nothing left but ashes and rubble. Five of the Sodder children, Maurice, Martha Lee, Louis, Jennie, and Betty, were gone. The ruins of the Sodder home were searched until 11am that Christmas morning, but not a single trace of any of the children was ever found. Despite the lack of any remains and the presence of suspicious evidence at the site of the home, local authorities assumed the children had died in the fire, and refused to investigate further, despite an innkeeper's claim that she had seen four of the five Sodder children in the company of four adults in her inn the week following the fire. Death certificates were issued on December 30, 1945, just five days after the fire, despite the fact that not one trace of human remains had been found at the home. The surviving Sodder family members staunchly believed that the children had been abducted, but were thwarted in their every effort to solve the mystery. In 1952, George and Jennie placed a large billboard at the site of the fire advertising a $10,000 reward for information relating to the children's disappearance. It remained on that spot until Mrs. Sodder's death in 1989. Although the land has since been sold and the billboard torn down, many in Fayetteville still wonder what became of the five Sodder children on that cold Christmas Eve over sixty years ago. For more information on this mystery, please visit the official site at www.sodderchildren.com. Burial: Body lost or destroyed Specifically: Remains were never found -- presumed dead. Record added: Dec 27 2006 By: Faith http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=vcsr&GSvcid=19989