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The desk sergeant on duty at the Barbarton, Ohio station was laboring over a report without much enthusiasm.

It was three in the morning after a hot July Saturday night.

The telephone bell shrilled in the barren, airless room. The officer listened to a woman's

voice, took down her missing husband's name, Lawrence P. White, then reassured her in the soothing tones he employed so often for these calls.

If he went into a bar with some of the men from his shop, he may have gotten to a little card game.

I wouldn't worry yet, ma'am. He may be home later.

He listened patiently while the worried wife explained that although her husband often took a few

drinks in the evening, he always returned home by one o'clock, and that he said he would be in by midnight

on this particular occasion. The elderly officer suggested, maybe with the heat he felt the drinks

and decided it wasn't safe to drive.

He may have pulled over to the curb for a nap.

I'll have the radio cruisers look for his car.

Though it seemed a routine case of a married man staying out a little later than his wife

expected, and though 99 out of 100 of these wandering husbands

arrive home in due course of time with a good excuse for their tardiness, he nevertheless

handed a description of the sedan and its license number to the radio operator. The information was

broadcast, but none of the radio car crews spotted the 33-old war

workers' automobile or its driver. That's how the case of the hanging dog began. A routine missing

person report. White did not return to his home that Sunday, July 30th, 1944.

Although police in the nearby city of Akron joined the search,

his car was not located. The Secret of Wolf's Creek.

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