The Mysterious Disappearance of Lynne Schulze
Decades Long Search for Missing Middlebury College Freshman Continues
By Shawn R. Dagle
On a cold Friday afternoon before the Christmas holiday Middlebury College Freshman Lynne Schulze vanished after leaving a group of friends to return to her dorm room to retrieve a favorite pencil.
Five decades later no trace of the missing college student has been found despite years of investigation, DNA analysis and more than a few promising leads.
The daughter of a schoolteacher and company executive Lynne wasn’t much different from many young girls growing up in postwar American suburbia.
Lynne loved the outdoors, liked to ski, ride a bike, enjoyed reading and kept a journal. She was also outgoing and intelligent.
Independent and unafraid Lynne was close to her two sisters and two brothers. While still a toddler, her father worked as general manager for the American Machine and Foundry Company’s Atomics Division in Greenwich, Connecticut.
A native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, her father had degrees in applied mathematics and mechanics, had worked as a physicist on the prototype design of the USS Nautilus and joined the American Machine and Foundry Company in 1955 as a supervisor of nuclear physics research. There he worked his way up to manager of the reactor engineering section and later nuclear development.
The family lived in Wilton, Connecticut for a number of years before moving to Pennsylvania in the early 1960s when Otto became vice-president and manager of the company’s atomic offices at its York plant. There Otto and his wife bought a home on Hillock Lane in Spring Garden Township in July of 1964. While her husband worked at the plant Lynne’s mother Virginia got a job as a substitute teacher.
When not in school Lynne spent her time playing tennis. In the summer of 1965, she competed in the York Country Club’s Junior Tennis Tournament in the girls 12 and under category.
Then in December of 1965 Lynne’s father resigned from American Machine and Foundry and accepted a job with the Singer Company’s Alemannia Division in Creussen, Germany. Her father’s new employer manufactured flatbed knitting machines. The family packed up their suitcases and moved to Nuremburg, Germany.
By 1967 the family was back in the states when Lynne’s father accepted a new position with Combustion Engineering Inc. as manager of the company’s international nuclear power division in Windsor, Connecticut. Her family lived in their new home on Brook Drive in Simsbury. There she attended high school where by all accounts she excelled academically.
A class representative and member of Simsbury High School’s field hockey team Lynne earned a letter of commendation for her performance on the 1970 National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. When not in school or writing in her journal – Lynne had a job working as a waitress.
In 1971 Lynne graduated from Simsbury High School. “Look to the future, remember the past but live for today,” was her senior quote.
In September Lynne left for Middlebury College in Vermont. Every week she talked with her parents over the telephone and exchanged letters with her mother. Two weeks before Thanksgiving Lynne made a surprise visit home to Simsbury and later spent the holiday recess at home after driving back north with a group of girls from town who also attended Middlebury.
On December 8 – just two days before she disappeared – Lynne called home and spoke with her mother. She appeared to be in good spirits. Still things hadn’t been easy these first few months of college. Lynne’s studies hadn’t gone as well as planned. Academically she wasn’t doing as good as she had at Simsbury High. Lynne was having trouble in philosophy and English Drama but was working hard and studying to raise her grades. According to the dean at Middlebury Lynne was “far from failing.”
That said Lynne told her friends at school that she was bored. Lynne talked about leaving college when the semester ended.
The day of her disappearance – December 10 – Lynne was walking across campus to take an exam with some friends when she suddenly decided to turn around and head back to her dorm room in Battell Hall to retrieve a favorite pencil she had left behind – part of a matching Cross pen and pencil set in the color green.
At around 12:30 p.m. she was seen eating prunes outside a health food store on Court Street. She was also reportedly spotted standing across the street from the bus station in downtown Middlebury near a local gas station.
Around this same time a fellow student encountered Lynne on US 7 either walking or hitchhiking. According to one account the fellow student attempted to talk to Lynne but it was apparent she was upset and didn’t want to talk. That was the last time Lynne was seen.
When Lynne – who had never missed a class before – failed to show for her English Drama exam people began to worry. The school called her parents believing she may have gone home. When it was apparent she had not the local authorities were contacted.
While Lynne on occasion had left campus and traveled for the weekend without telling her parents she had always returned. This time however she simply disappeared.
In her dorm room Lynne had left her college ID and driver’s license behind as well as all of her clothes except for the blue jeans, long sleeve navy blue pullover, brown colored nylon ski parka and hiking boots she was wearing. Perhaps most alarmingly Lynne never touched $185 left in her banking account and only had $30 on her person when she went missing.
Her father journeyed north to Middlebury College and spoke with faculty and students but few clues were forthcoming. While initially it was hoped she had just decided to get away for a short period of time it soon became apparent that something was terribly wrong and that Lynne may have fallen victim to foul play.
Early on there were some promising leads in Lynne’s disappearance. That January the wife of a local newspaper publisher said she had seen a girl “startingly” similar to Lynne in a local restaurant. The girl appeared to be sick and was as “white as paper.” Nothing however seemed to pan out. Police were baffled by Lynne’s disappearance.
It wouldn’t be until decades later that one of the more promising leads developed in Lynne’s case. In 2012 police said they received a tip that accused murderer and real estate heir Robert Durst had operated the health food store Lynne visited the day of her disappearance in Middlebury.
Acquitted of murdering and dismembering his neighbor and suspected of murdering his wife in 1982 – Durst was arrested in 2015 for murdering Susan Berman before she could speak with investigators regarding his wife’s disappearance.
According to police in 1971 and 1972 Durst operated the health food store All Good Things in downtown Middelbury. It was there they say Lynne was seen standing in front eating prunes she had purchased from inside the afternoon she disappeared.
While police have indicated that Durst operated the store in 1971 and 1972 it is not clear when he moved to the Middlebury area or when he took over the store. As late as February of 1971 the store was owned by David Vilner and went by a completely different name OM Natural Health Foods according to newspaper reports and advertisements at the time.
The earliest record of Durst living in Middlebury we could find was a newspaper report in mid-April of 1972 indicating that he had paid a fine for operating an uninspected vehicle. Police said they could find no indication that Durst had been questioned at the time of Lynne’s disappearance.
When news of the tip was made public years later by police, Durst’s defense attorney claimed that his client had no connection to the missing college freshman.
Another apparent break in the case recently came when investigators believed they had potentially linked Lynne to the remains of an unidentified Jane Doe discovered in West Haven, Connecticut in 1979.
On April 20th of that year – on the New Haven Water Company property – the skeletonized remains of a young woman with a lace bra and travel clock were discovered. The cause of death could not be determined and there was no identification on her person. The unknown woman became known as the West Haven Jane Doe.
Decades later investigators were able to make a mitochondrial DNA match between Lynne and the unknown woman. Less effective in identifying unknown persons than other DNA technology a check of dental records determined that the West Haven Jane Doe however was not Lynne Schulze.
The potential match only came to light this July when police announced that they had made a positive identification of the West Haven Jane Doe as 29-year-old Sarah “Sally” Abbott.
To this date no trace of Lynne has been found.
-September 1, 2023
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Sources
The Hartford Courant “Simsbury Girl Listed Missing By College” Kirk G. Hastian January 22, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Search For Coed Still Fruitless” February 1, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Decades Later Disappearance Still Baffles” Tim Johnson
The Burlington Free Press “Father of Coed Fears Foul Play” January 22, 1972
The Hartford Courant “Business In Brief” August 5, 1973
The Record Journal “AMF Atomic Division General Mngr. Named” September 24, 1959 AP
The Gazette and Daily Photo Caption June 6, 1964
The York Dispatch “Yorker Filling Top Industrial Post in Germany” January 20, 1966
The Gazette and Daily Property Deeds October 25, 1965
The Gazette and Daily Property Deeds July 13, 1964
York Daily Record “Competition Launched in CCY Jr. Net Event” August 18, 1965
The York Dispatch “Suburban Appoints Nurse for Substitute Teachers”
The Hartford Courant “Simsbury High Students Given Merit Citations” October 25, 1970
The Burlington Free Press “Missing Coed’s Parents Ask Aid” January 21, 1972
The Brattleboro Reformer “Missing Coed Sought” January 24, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Police Continue Search for Coed Lynne Schulze February 8, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Missing Cold Cases Nag at Families” October 30, 2005
The Burlington Free Press “Missing Coed Seen Last Monday” Janaury 24, 1972
Rutland Daily Herald “The Trend Toward Natural Foods Is Reflected in Vermont” Tom
Rutland Daily Herald October 24, 1970
Rutland Daily Heraald June 2, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Assault Charge is Dropped” April 18, 1972
The Bridgeport Post “Vermont Hunt for Missing Co-ed Recalls Welden Case in ‘46” Avrid Westmoreland February 3, 1972
The Burlington Free Press “Durst Middlebury Link Explored” Mike Donoghue and Adam Silverman March 25, 2015