Jacqueline Rains Kracman & Melvin Uphoff, 1965, Nebraska

[Faith]

Anguish of not knowing lasts decades for families
By Elizabeth Ahlin, Midlands News Service
04/19/2008

The worst part is not knowing.
In the nearly 43 years since Jacqueline Rains Kracman and Melvin Uphoff disappeared from their Nebraska homes, their families have been seeking answers.

Where are they? Did they leave willingly? Did they leave together? Are they still alive?

The missing Nebraskans, their families and their ordeal are the subject of a new documentary film, “Closure: Can It Really Be Possible?”

Family members recently attended a private screening to see the results of months of interviews, research and editing by filmmaker Stacy Heatherly of Papillion.

Heatherly’s film takes viewers through the questions the families have been facing for years.

Michele Sells, Uphoff’s daughter, was just 2 years old when her father disappeared in the fall of 1965. In the film, her mother, Myrna Dey, details the last day they spent with him.

The Rising City, Neb., man treated his children to a family day filled with pheasant hunting, roller skating and lunch in nearby Shelby, Neb. Dinner that evening was at the home of Uphoff’s parents.

That night, when Dey was getting the children ready for bed, Uphoff told her he was going to Shelby for beer.
He was 31. His family never saw him again.

Kracman, 18, disappeared around the same time as Uphoff — after telling her family that she was going to Glenwood, Iowa, for a weekend with her roommate.

Kracman, who was separated from her husband, left her children with her family. As far as the family can tell, she never went to Glenwood.

They never saw her again. Kracman’s car was found outside her home in Columbus, Neb.

In the film, Leo Meister, who was Butler County sheriff in

1965, is the first one to mention rumors that Kracman and Uphoff had been having an affair.

At the time, people thought they had left together. Uphoff took only his coin collection and his car; Kracman took most of her clothes. Uphoff’s 1954 Oldsmobile was never recovered. He was declared legally dead in the 1970s.
For years, the disappearances weren’t discussed within the Rains and Uphoff families.

But Sells has spent much of her adult life compiling information on the disappearances and trying to find Uphoff and Kracman.

There is no consensus among family members about what happened. Some think the couple ran off together; others think they were harmed. They all say answers would have been easier to come by if the disappearances had been thoroughly investigated in 1965.

“I really don’t think there was an investigation,” said Sharon Henggeler, Kracman’s sister. “If there was, it didn’t amount to much.”

The film has two goals, Heatherly said: to tell the story of Uphoff and Kracman, and to bring awareness to the Campaign for the Missing, an effort to establish protocols for dealing with adult missing persons cases.

The campaign has been spearheaded by Kelly Jolkowski, an Omaha woman whose 19-year-old son, Jason, disappeared almost seven years ago.

The protocols being promoted were drafted by the U.S. Department of Justice.

States need step-by-step instructions on handling missing persons cases involving adults, Jolkowski said, because they aren’t always taken as seriously as missing children cases.

Such laws have been adopted in at least 11 states. Jolkowski hopes to see one passed in Nebraska.

Also, law enforcement agencies sometimes overlook available resources, such as the Center for Human Identification, a federally funded lab in Texas that processes DNA of family members of the missing and enters the results in a national database for free.

The Nebraska State Patrol’s cold case unit investigated the Uphoff and Kracman cases a few years ago at the urging of Sells and others. The patrol has now turned the matter back to the Butler County Sheriff’s Office, Sells said.
State Patrol Sgt. Robert Frank, who investigated the disappearances and who appears in the documentary, did not return calls requesting comment.

“There’s nothing anywhere to show that a homicide occurred,” Frank says in the film.

According to the documentary, law enforcement officials did not interview Kracman’s husband, Dennis Kracman, or her roommate, Sally Fisher, in 1965. Melvin Uphoff was Dennis Kracman’s boss at a service station in Rising City.
It wasn’t until years later, when the State Patrol did its cold case investigation, that Dennis Kracman and Fisher were questioned. Those interviews weren’t fruitful.

Frank urged the families to accept the idea that Uphoff and Jacqueline Kracman left.

“They need to come to terms with it and accept it,” he said.

http://www.nptelegraph.com (http://www.nptelegraph.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=19500695&BRD=377&PAG=461&dept_id=601696&rfi=6)

[Faith]

Young mother, lover still missing after 40 years

Sep 24 2005

Forty years ago, Jackie Rains-Kracman and Melvin Uphoff vanished. The two families met for the first time recently in Columbus seeking to ease the lingering pain and, perhaps, find a clue that had been overlooked in the case. What follows is the story of the disappearances and the families' gathering.

By MEGAN STROMBERG, Special to the Telegram

COLUMBUS - Even though she was 9-years-old the last time she saw her sister, Becky Leslie was so certain the woman she locked eyes with at Wal-Mart in 1999 was her sister that it sent her into a panic attack.

When Leslie, a Wal-Mart employee, returned from helping another checker, the woman in jean capris and a pink blouse was gone.

Her co-workers said she probably just saw an angel.

Leslie disagrees. She is adamant the woman was her older sister, Jacquelyn Ann "Jackie" Rains-Kracman, who never returned after telling her family she was leaving with a girlfriend for a wedding in Glenwood, Iowa, on Sept. 24, 1965. Everything was the same, the part in her hair, the mole above the right side of her lip, her deep brown eyes.

"I kick myself for not talking to her right away," Leslie said.

The only woman to marry in Glenwood that day has said she doesn't know anyone by that name. Nor does she recognize the name of Jackie's friend, Sally, who was supposed to take her to the wedding.

Sally returned home.

Nineteen-year-old Jackie never has.

She disappeared without a trace.

Law enforcement officials - from the Butler County Sheriff's Office to the FBI and CIA - have told her they never found any sign of foul play. The Rains family thinks Sally may know why Jackie was leaving, or where she was truly planning to go. They do not think she was involved in her disappearance. They have asked her for help, but they still don't have answers.

One of Jackie's younger sisters still can't forget how her sister was packing two very large suitcases for the trip. Something didn't seem right.

"She was packing everything. I asked her 'Why?' She said she needed to put these clothes somewhere," Sharon Henggeler recalled during a recent family interview.

Henggeler, now of Omaha, was just a year younger than Jackie. She remembers the day clearly.

The Rains' children were still helping their parents unpack things in their Columbus home. The family had just moved across town. Jackie, meanwhile, had already been married and given birth to a boy and a girl. A few weeks earlier, her husband had filed for divorce on Sept. 11. She was now living with Sally.

Henggeler remembers helping her father move the washing machine when a friend stopped by, asking her to go riding around. She agreed, asking if they could stop by and visit her sister, Jackie, before she left for the wedding in Iowa. The family agrees the "wedding trip" was just a story.

That's when Jackie was still packing her suitcases.

"It made me feel uneasy. Months before she said when her ship came in, she would be leaving," Henggeler recalled. When she asked Jackie what she meant by that, Henggeler was told "she would be leaving" and would go where it was sunny and warm.

Henggeler asked her sister who would care for her children, then 2 and 6 months old. Jackie said she was not going to take them cross country.

After saying goodbye to Jackie, Henggeler and her friend drove around Columbus. She remembers seeing her sister and three of her friends drive by, headed south over the viaduct. Her sister, she said, was crouched down in the backseat, as if to hide she was in the vehicle.

Still, Henggeler said the three friends Jackie was with refuse to say where they took her.

The family does not suspect them.

"I've never understood. If the three people who saw her last, if they did nothing criminal, why won't they say where they took her?" Henggeler wondered recently during a gathering with her siblings, Jackie's son and grandsons and another family.

But they do want some answers.

So does Melvin Uphoff's family.

Even though their dad went missing 40 years ago, at a time when two of the kids barely knew them, his children want answers. They wonder, is he dead? Did he leave with Jackie?

Did the couple start a new life together? Has someone in the area kept them abreast of their family's lives?

Rumors were rampant around the tiny community of Rising City when the couple disappeared. The Rains's say they had heard their sister was having an affair with 30-year-old Uphoff, who managed the co-op where Jackie's husband worked.

His wife at the time, Myrna, confirms there were rumors.

She and Melvin had been married for nearly a decade and had already welcomed four children to their home when Jackie's husband came to the door with the news.

"Her husband came to the door and said they were having an affair," the quiet woman remembered.

That was three months before the couple disappeared.

When confronted with the news by Myrna and his mother, Melvin denied the allegations.

Myrna said he was "OK" for about a month, but then began acting differently.

On Oct. 24, 1965, Myrna, Melvin and their four children, ages 10, 8, 2 and 6 months, spent the day together in Shelby. They went roller-skating and had stayed at a hotel before returning home to Rising City.

Myrna remembers it clearly.

She was getting baby Marché ready for bed when Melvin came in the room and said he was going back to Shelby for a beer. He asked if Myrna wanted to go with him. She asked why he was returning there, when the family had just left the town. Myrna declined his offer.

That was 11:30 p.m.

Melvin left in a 1954 blue and white Oldsmobile.

That was the last time she saw her first husband. He didn't give any indication of never returning.

He didn't take any clothes. The only thing Myrna discovered missing was Melvin's coin collection.

The car, his coin collection, Melvin. None of the three has been found.

When Melvin didn't show up for work, Myrna went to his parents and said he didn't come home the night before. They told her to "go back into town and be quiet."

That was Monday. When Myrna asked the next day if they should report him missing, his dad and uncle finally filed a report Tuesday evening.

The family suspects the delay was because the elder family members were trying to protect Myrna and her children.

Meanwhile, Jackie was not reported missing until 1994. Her parents told her eight siblings not to mention anything to anyone. Four of the children recall never mentioning Jackie's absence, not even to their aunts, uncles or cousins. If anyone asked, they were told to say she had moved.

But Leslie recalls what one aunt said.

"She said she saw a woman at a rest stop. She said she sounded like Jackie."

They're tired of being quiet. They feel they have a right to have answers. So do Jackie's children. Her daughter, Denise, contacted the Rains family when she was 18. They had a picnic with Denise and her brother, Todd. The relationships have continued to grow since the reunion.

"How do you start a process like that with people you've never known," Todd said, adding that he could have met some of them on the street over the years.

When asked what he thinks happened, Todd hesitated before answering.

"It's more of a Š in the heart, I wish I knew, but Š " he trailed off. "I guess I have been moving along with my life and hoping after 40 years somebody would come and approach me and say, 'Hey, I'm your mom.'"

He admits that he hoped for that news before Jackie's parents died.

"You don't know. You don't know if they've come in touch with you," Todd said in a firm voice that commanded attention from his aunts and uncles gathered in the room.

Maybe it's a coincidence, but Leslie says she saw a white car at her mother's funeral. A man and a woman sat inside, watching from a distance. That same car appeared at her father's funeral. She admits it could be a coincidence, but she wants to believe more.

Melvin's family, meanwhile has seen some oddities as well.

Former Butler County Sheriff Leo Meister attended a family funeral, looking for Melvin to show up in 1973. He didn't.

The family still has questions. Why did Melvin's missing person's file contain only about 50 copies of a "Wanted" poster distributed in 1967 for non-payment of child support. Why haven't family members been asked about the days prior to his disappearance.

His family is so desperate for answers that his oldest son, Michele Sells of Bellwood, has placed ads in The Banner-Press newspaper.

The latest 4x3 inch ad appeared Sept. 1 along with a picture of Melvin and read:

"We are still looking for any information on the disappearance of this man. Age 30. Now 70. Disappeared Oct. 24, 1965, from Rising City, Nebraska. Left in a blue and white 1954 Oldsmobile. Please send information to Michele Sells."

Sells came to the interview with a black Rubbermaid tote full of a 4-inch white binder, a 2-inch black binder and several spiral notebooks. Court records, hand-written notes, letters from law enforcement, news clippings and other things appeared as Sells searched through the file. Along with the paper files, Sells also arrived with a videotape of her father made from an old 8 mm film. On the tape, Jackie and her family appeared. They had stopped by the Uphoff house. Myrna doesn't remember why. When asked, she said she was not friends with Jackie.

The room fell silent as the two families watched a few minutes of the tape, in which Jackie sat in a white blouse. Her husband sat nearby, holding baby Denise.

"We want an answer," Melvin's youngest, Marché said.

"Even if they don't want to be found, it would be nice to know if they're alive," Todd said.

Rising City residents have told Melvin's family they think he tried to contact them two years after disappearing. Sells said a man phoned the family's old phone number, asking for Myrna. When told she didn't live there, the man hung up.

Just seconds later, the phone rang at a family member's home.

"They said it sounded like they were calling from a pay phone," Sells said. Eventually, the operator interrupted and told the caller to insert more coins for the call.

Sells has also been in contact with law enforcement officers locally and nationally. She continues to ask Meister for answers and has also contacted FBI and CIA agents. However, both families say they are told no crime was committed. Sells has even contacted professional locators, with no luck.

Myrna even spent a number of years searching for answers. For a number of years, she traveled to David City to ask Meister for answers.

"I was in a state of shock," she said about her husband's disappearance. Six months later, Myrna moved to Shelby with her children so they could be closer to her extended family. "I knew I had to be mother, I knew I had to be a dad, knew I had to clothe and feed them."

Forty years later, she admits she has moved on and is comfortable with the search Sells has waged.

"I don't want him back," Myrna said.

Melvin's children say they aren't searching for a relationship with their father. They just want answers.

Both families are certain that if the couple disappeared today, whether willingly or otherwise, technology would facilitate a more comprehensive search. Media coverage, alone, would shine light on the cases.

"It would have been reported right away," Henggeler said.

Over the years, Todd has maintained a relationship with his father, Dennis. Todd recalls a conversation Dennis had with a state trooper in March of this year.

"I saw his eyes. He misses her, but he doesn't know where she's at," Todd said. "His eyes were like he was telling me, I wish I could tell you where she was at."

Both families see news reports of missing couples and young adults and their pain is revisited all over, they said.

"My heart goes to them and I pray they find them," Marché Augustine said, adding that it hurts, even though she wouldn't know the sound of her father's voice if she heard it. Throughout the interview, she switched between calling him by his first name and referring to him as her father.

She recalls that while eating in a cafe with her mother a few years ago, she saw a man that caught her attention.

"I asked mom, 'Isn't that Melvin over there?'"

Henggeler admits she can't watch news reports about missing people who are found.

"I just cry," she said amidst tears.

Several times throughout the families' meeting, she cried.

"You hang on to hope. You think maybe someday you'll get a knock on the door, and it will be her or a brother or sister who have come to say 'We found her,'" Henggeler said.

"You have to have faith in God to have the strength to get through it."

Still, Henggeler asked how long questions can go unanswered.

"How long can a soul survive not knowing?"

The Rains's parents died not knowing the truth about their daughter.

John Rains of Columbus said if he could ask his late wife the answer, he would.

"They know now," he said about his parents.

Henggeler said if Jackie had returned home 15 or 20 years after disappearing, she would have "read her the riot act." Now, though, she just wants to hug her.

"Every Mother's Day, mom thought she would come back," Leslie said about her oldest sister.

Leslie said she believes her sister is still alive and she wants her to know she still loves and cares for her. She says the truth will happen eventually.

"God only knows when that will be," she said.

Nebraska State Patrol Sgt. Robert Frank, director of the state's Cold Case Division, confirmed his office is again looking into Jackie and Melvin's cases. He said he is working in conjunction with the Butler County Sheriff's Department.

"We're still investigating it and running down new leads," Frank said.

Butler County Sheriff Mark Hecker said he originally directed both families to Frank because of the resources at the department's disposal. He will be meeting with Frank at the end of the month to discuss the case.

Former Butler County Sheriff Leo Meister, who was in office at the time of the disappearances, could not be reached for comment.
http://www.columbustelegram.com/articles/2005/09/18/news/news1.txt

[Faith]

Relatives left to wonder why two vanished in '65

Published Monday
September 19, 2005

Relatives left to wonder why two vanished in '65

BY ELIZABETH AHLIN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

The last time Melvin Uphoff's wife saw him, he was leaving their home in Rising City, in Butler County, Neb., to pick up beer in a neighboring town. He was 31 years old, and he never returned.

Jacqueline Rains Kracman, 18, who was separated from her husband, Dennis Kracman, left their two young children with her parents in Columbus, Neb., about 15 miles north of Rising City. She said she was heading to a wedding in Glenwood, Iowa. Family members never heard from her again.

Uphoff was Dennis Kracman's boss at a service station in Rising City. Family members believe that's how Uphoff and Jackie Kracman knew each other. The two vanished about a month apart in 1965.

Forty years later, both families still wonder what happened.

"I have been trying since 1989 to locate him. I went down every street, every avenue. There's no paper trail on these two people at all," said Michele Uphoff Sells, who was 2 when her father disappeared.

Sells lives near Columbus. Nearly every day she drives some of the same roads her father did in his 1954 blue-and-white Oldsmobile, which was never recovered by authorities.

She has hired private investigators. At home, she keeps a plastic box filled with evidence of her search. She has notebooks full of research, photos, home movies, newspaper clippings and depositions from insurance hearings when Melvin Eugene Uphoff was declared legally dead in 1972.

She also has the family's stories of the last day she spent with her father, who took Sells and her siblings on a pheasant hunt and then roller skating.

But she wants to know more.

Jim Rains of Columbus, Kracman's younger brother, was 12 when she disappeared. He remembers his sister as a lively, energetic girl.

"She drove a little too fast on the gravel roads," Rains said, laughing.

"I just remember a very loving, caring, happy person, which makes it hard for me to really accept the fact that she just up and left and moved away somewhere and started a whole new life."

The Nebraska State Patrol says that may be exactly what happened.

Sgt. Robert Frank of the State Patrol's cold case division agreed to look into the case this year at the request of Rains. Frank is still investigating, but he hasn't found any evidence that a crime was committed.

"Back in the '60s, it was easy to disappear. You could change your name, change your Social Security number," Frank said.

Members of both families believe Kracman and Uphoff were seeing each other. Uphoff's family assumed they ran away together. But more than 20 years went by before the families discussed the disappearances with each other.

The dates are fuzzy, but Kracman's family believes the young woman they always called Jackie disappeared in late September 1965, about a month before Uphoff vanished.

Uphoff's family reported him missing immediately, but Kracman was not officially reported missing until 1992.

Frank said records from the initial Butler County Sheriff's Office investigation do not show any signs of a crime, but Sells and Rains aren't convinced that everything was done in those early days to find out what happened.

Jackie Rains was 16 when she married Dennis Kracman. By 18, she had two children. At the time of her disappearance, the Kracmans were separated.

She was a coil winder at an electronics company in Columbus, where she was renting a house with her two children and a roommate.

Sharon Henggeler remembers her sister Jackie as a stubborn girl who liked to get her way, but she was also big on family.

Henggeler and Rebecca Leslie, Jackie's youngest sister, both said she was overcome with homesickness during much of her marriage, calling home nearly every day when she lived in Rising City.

Henggeler, who was 17 at the time, saw her sister the night she left. Henggeler had stopped by with a friend to visit Jackie as she packed for the trip to Glenwood.

"When we stopped by, she wasn't packing for a weekend, she was packing everything," Henggeler said.

Jackie Kracman said she was going to attend a wedding, but Henggeler was worried. When she stopped at her sister's house the following Monday to drop off Jackie's children, her suspicions were confirmed.

"I knew when I hit that front porch that she wasn't going to be there," Henggeler said. "I knocked and knocked and knocked on the door."

Jackie Kracman's roommate told the family she didn't know where Jackie had gone. Henggeler said Jackie must have had help, because she didn't leave with her car. Her parents were left to wonder if their eldest daughter had abandoned her family.

After a while, the Rains family suspected foul play, but they didn't have any evidence to support that theory.

"That's just a gut feeling," Rains said.

Rains and Sells say they don't believe Uphoff and Jackie Kracman could have run away without someone knowing what happened. After so many years, some of the people who knew them, including Jackie's parents, have died, and the memories of those who are still around are fading.

Dennis Kracman, who still lives near Columbus, moved on long ago, remarrying when his children were young. But Rains and Sells still want to know what happened. With the 40th anniversary of the disappearances approaching, they're hoping someone will come forward with information.

"We just want to know the truth," Sells said. "Somebody out there knows the truth."
http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_pg=1638&u_sid=2020340

[Faith]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

For further information contact:
Kelly Jolkowski
402-932-0095

kelly.jolkowski@projectjason.org


OMAHA MISSING PERSONS' DAY ON THE CUE CENTER NATIONAL TOUR

Omaha Area Families of the Missing Gather to Remember Their Loved Ones

Omaha, NE, - June 13th, 2007- June 13th, 2007, marks the six year anniversary of the disappearance of then 19 year-old Jason Jolkowski from his home in Omaha, NE. To bring awareness for area missing persons cases and garner community support for the families of the missing, Omaha Mayor Mike Fahey is declaring June 13th as Omaha Missing Persons' Day. Project Jason, founded by the family of Jason Jolkowski, is sponsoring an event to commemorate this day. It will be held at Omaha's Memorial Park at 56th and Underwood Ave from 6:30-8:30pm. The public is invited to attend.

This event will also serve to honor four other families of missing persons from the area. They, along with the parents of Jason Jolkowski, will share their stories.

In addition, the Cue Center, a nonprofit organization from North Carolina led by founder Monica Caison, which provides assistance for families of the missing, has included Omaha and this event as a stop on their national tour to bring awareness for numerous missing person's cases. The 4th annual "On the Road to Remember Tour" begins on June 11th and concludes on June 21st, covering 2,400 miles, 22 stops in 11 states, and 75 missing person cases.

This moving ceremony will begin with a march led by the Air Force Color Guard with bagpipe accompaniment. The Mayor's office will then present the Omaha Missing Persons' Day proclamation to Kelly Jolkowski, President and Founder of Project Jason, and to Monica Caison, Founder of the Cue Center.

The event will also include music and prayer, and will culminate with a symbolic white dove release by each represented family.

Featured Missing Persons' Cases:

Jason Jolkowski disappeared from the driveway of his home in Omaha, NE on Wednesday, June 13th, 2001. He was then 19 years of age. He was preparing to go to work at his part-time job, and was last seen doing his weekly chores outside.

Erin Pospisil was just 15 years old on June 3rd, 2001, when she left her home in Cedar Rapids, IA to go visit a friend. Her friend was not home, and when a car pulled up, Erin went over and spoke with the occupants. She entered that vehicle and was never seen again.

Singer-songwriter Gina Bos disappeared on October 17, 2000 after performing at a pub in Lincoln, NE. The next morning, her vehicle was found across the street from the pub with the trunk ajar and her guitar inside.

Nearly 42 years ago, 18 year-old Jackie Rains-Kracman left her home in Columbus, NE, telling her family she was going to a wedding with a friend in Glenwood, IA. The friend returned home, but Jackie didn't.

University of Missouri sophomore Jesse Ross vanished on November 21, 2006, after attending a model United Nations conference at the Sheraton Hotel in Chicago, IL. After a dance, Jesse was seen heading towards his hotel room, which was a ten minute walk from the Sheraton. Jesse never made it back.

About Project Jason:

Project Jason, located in Omaha, NE was founded in 2003 by the parents of missing young adult Jason Jolkowski. “Our mission as a non profit organization is to create and increase public awareness of missing people through a variety of outreach and educational activities. Project Jason seeks to bring hope and assistance to families of the missing by providing resources and support.” Project Jason serves families of the missing nationwide and has been instrumental in the recent passage of missing persons' legislation in several states through their Campaign for the Missing program. To learn more about Project Jason, please see http://www.projectjason.org, or contact Kelly Jolkowski at 402-932-0095 or kelly.jolkowski@projectjason.org

About Cue Center:

Founded in 1994, the Cue Center, (Community United Effort) based in Wilmington, N.C., provides support, services and search efforts to families of the missing. For full On the Road to Remember tour dates and locations, as well as a complete listing of cases featured on the tour, e-mail cuecenter@aol.com or call Monica Caison at (910) 343-1131 or the 24 Hour Line at (910) 232-1687.For more information, please see http://ncmissingpersons.org/


###

Important Note: If it is raining, or rain is threatening, the event will be held at Holy Name Church at 2901 N Fontenelle Blvd. (As of this writing, the chance of rain is very high, so it is imperative that the rain location be communicated.)

If the event takes place at Memorial Park, attendees need to bring their own chairs

[Faith]

CLOSURE: CAN IT REALLY BE POSSIBLE

In May of 2002 Stacy Heatherly received a call from a female from a small town in Nebraska. The caller introduced herself as the daughter of a man who had come up missing one month after Sally Fisher’s roommate and friend Jackie Rains- Kracman came up missing. The woman caller indicated Sally Fisher was listed on a national missing person web site as the last person to see her room mate alive. Stacy contacted Sally Fisher and asked her about the case.

Because of rumors 40 years ago, Sally was under the assumption Jackie had left of her own accord and was surprise that in 40 years Jackie had not contacted her family. It is also indicated on the National missing person’s web site that Sally Fisher and Jackie had planned to travel to Iowa for a wedding, which they never attended. They surmise Sally Fisher knew her roommate was going to leave. Sally Fisher remembers making the call to her mother letting her know they were coming for the weekend, but claims that Jackie never disclosed to her that she never intended to go. She denies the claims that she knew Jackie was planning on leaving. She also denies rumors that she knew Jackie and Melvin were having an affair. Stacy gave Melvin Uphoff’s daughter, Michele Sally’s number so she could call her first hand. The two had several conversations and left the calls open ended with an invitation to call any time.

Law enforcement would not contact Sally Fisher for an interview in regard to Jackie’s disappearance until almost 40 years after Jackie’s disappearance. Given the fact that 40 years had passed Sally Fisher was unable to recall many details. Out of respect and understanding and as a request from the Uphoff family she agreed and underwent hypnosis. She did recall many events and hopes to undergo other sessions in an attempt to recall more details. Sally Fisher reports that Jackie was fearful of her husband Dennis Kracman and many times fled to get away from his violent behavior. Many times the two would get a motel room and Dennis would always find them. The day after Jackie’s disappearance Sally reports that Dennis found her at a motel where she had been staying and shoved her into the door violently demanding her to tell him where his wife was. When he busted into the room and explored all the rooms and the closets, convinced Jackie wasn’t there he left speeding out of the parking lot. Sally reports that to this day, that scene and Dennis’s temper haunts her.

Jackie Rains – Kracman went missing Friday, September 24, 1965 from Columbus, NE. She was 18 at the time. She dropped her son age 6 months and daughter age 1 1/2 off at her parents home that morning with a promise she would return when back from her trip to Glenwood Iowa to attend a wedding. She never returned. Her car was found outside her residence with the keys in the ignition. Jackie’s parents called the number Jackie had left with them. The number was not a working number. Since Jackie would call her mother every day, her mother knew something was wrong when she did not hear from her daughter.

Melvin Uphoff went missing October 24, 1965 from Rising City, NE. He was 5’8, 160 pounds with blue eyes. The night he went missing he had taken his wife and children for a family night out. Melvin went pheasant hunting that day. The family had dinner at their Grandma Peck’s house. They went roller skating in Rising City, had a snack at the Hotel bar and grill in Shelby, NE and arrived home around 11PM. Upon returning home Melvin asked his wife Myna if she would like to go to the bar with him to have a drink. She declined. He left in his unstable 1954 Blue and White Oldsmobile Club Coupe 88 VIN 547M9278 that he had purchased from Arthur Kowalski when a rod went out in it during a hunting trip. Arthur Kowalski would report later that he was surprised if Melvin could get very far in that car because of its poor condition.

No law enforcement ever visited or questioned the bartender to inquire as to if Melvin made it to the bar that night. On October 25th Myrna received a call before 11Am saying Melvin did not show up for work. Myrna called Melvin’s mother. Melvin’s mother Mary Peck told Myrna she believed Melvin would return so instructed her not to report him missing, but instead to go home and tell no one. Myrna did as she was instructed. On October 26th Melvin’s Uncle Oscar went to the Butler County Sheriff Leo Meister and reported Melvin missing. No report was filed until November 26th, 1965 when Myrna filed a Non Support Warrant. Not until then was any interest taken by law enforcement into Melvin’s disappearance. All attempts to follow up has fallen on Myrna, no one from the sheriff’s office ever contacted Myrna. Still it is assumed by Sheriff Leo Meister that Melvin left of his own accord. It is also assumed by Leo Meister that Jackie and Melvin left together, although the dates of each missing are one month apart.

Myna reports none of Melvin’s personal affects were missing from the house. Melvin had a coin collection he kept in a safe which when investigated 3 to 4 months after the disappearance was reported to have been missing. Clarence Glock, Postmaster of Rising City, NE claims Melvin had the coin collection in the back seat of his car and that he showed it to him just before he disappeared. On October 16th, 1966 there was an article in the Des Moines, Iowa paper that reported a suitcase containing a handwritten note and a coin collection estimated at five thousand to seven thousand dollars had been found by a hunter northeast of Herold. Mrs. Peck sent in checks that offered a sample of Melvin’s handwriting to the Sheriff of Polk County where the coin collection was found. The criminal investigator Elden Lewis sent Mrs. Peck a letter on October 20, 1966 concluding the handwriting sample in the coin collection and Melvin’s handwriting did not match.

Social Security reports that neither Melvin nor Jackie’s SS# have had any activity since their disappearance. Motor Vehicle Division reports claim they do not contain any such name. July 1972 Equitable Life Insurance came out to interview Leo Meister. The insurance company was assured by Leo Meister that an active investigation was still being conducted. Although this was new news to the Uphoff family who had not been welcomed when questioning Leo Meister about the investigation. October, 1972 Melvin Uphoff was declared dead. On November 15th, 1972 Equitable Life Insurance interviewed Dennis Kracman (Jackie Rains husband), Nadine Sloup ( Owner of Texaco Station), Mary Peck ( Melvin’s Mother), Clarence Glock (Postmaster of Rising City), Larry Garhan ( Vice President of Farmers State Bank), Ted Pieters ( Owner of Pieters Grocery Store), Mr. & Mrs. Kilgore ( Acquaintance of Mary Peck), Leo Meister ( Sheriff of Butler County), Dean Struebring ( County Clerk), Carl Rafferty ( MGR of Dale Electronics), Mrs. John Reins ( Jackie’s Mother), Jerome Weister ( Postmaster of Columbus ). On August 7, 1973 Depositions were taken. Those depositions proved to the insurance company that Melvin was still missing and the life insurance was to be paid out.
http://stacyheatherly.com/closure.asp

[Faith]

http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll116/helpfindthemissing/041908kcmissing.jpg
Missing Nebraskans Melvin Uphoff and Jacqueline Rains Kracman and their families are the subject of a documentary, "Closure: Can It Really Be Possible?"

http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_page=2798&u_sid=10314901&u_rss=1&

[Faith]

Left: Rains-Kracman, circa 1965;
Right: Age-progression to an unknown age
http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll116/helpfindthemissing/rains-kracman_jacquelyn.jpghttp://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll116/helpfindthemissing/rains-kracman_jacquelyn_ap.jpg

Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance

# Missing Since: September 24, 1965 from Columbus, Nebraska
# Classification: Missing
# Age: 18 years old
# Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian female. Brown eyes. Rains-Kracman has a mole above the right side of her lip. Her nickname is Jackie (sometimes spelled "Jacque"). Her name may be spelled "Jacqueline."

Details of Disappearance

Rains-Kracman was last seen at her parents' home in Columbus, Nebraska on September 24, 1965. She left her two children, who were then two years old and six months old, with her parents and told them she was going of a weekend trip to a wedding in Glenwood, Iowa with her female friend and roommate. Her friend returned, but Rains-Kracman has never been heard from again. When authorities investigated her case later, they discovered that the only woman who got married in Glenwood that day did not know Rains-Kracman or her friend. Rains-Kracman's friend subsequently refused to say where she had taken her.

Rains-Kracman's family did not report her as a missing person until the 1990s. They believe she left of her own accord. She had married at sixteen but was separated from her husband by 1965, and her husband had filed for divorce in September. Rains-Kracman's sister says she packed two large suitcases when she left home, which the sister found odd, since it was supposed to be only a short trip.

Melvin Uphoff disappeared a month after Rains-Kracman did and has never been heard from again. He was her husband's boss at a service station in Rising City, Nebraska and he and Rains-Kracman were apparently having an affair in 1965. Authorities and both families believe the couple ran away together to start a new life.

Both Uphoff and Rains-Kracman's family members believe the missing pair tried to contact them in the years after 1965. One of Rains-Kracman's sisters said a woman stongly resembling her missing sister attended their mother's funeral. The same woman appeared at Rains-Kracman's sister's place of work and stared at her, but disappeared again before she could be confronted.

Rains-Kracman is described as a lively, energetic person. She has eight siblings. She was working as coil winder at an electronics company in Columbus in 1965. She left her car behind when she disappeared. Both Rains-Kracman and Uphoff's cases remain unsolved; their families are continuing to search for them.

Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Nebraska State Patrol
402-471-4545

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/r/rains-kracman_jacquelyn.html

[Faith]

Left: Uphoff, circa 1965;
Right: Age-progression to age 74 (circa 2009)
http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll116/helpfindthemissing/uphoff_melvin.jpghttp://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll116/helpfindthemissing/uphoff_melvin_ap.jpg

Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance

# Missing Since: October 24, 1965 from Rising City, Nebraska
# Classification: Missing
# Date of Birth: April 2, 1935
# Age: 30 years old
# Height and Weight: 5'8, 160 pounds
# Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian male. Brown hair, blue eyes. Uphoff's nickname is Mel. He has fillings in his teeth.
# Clothing/Jewelry Description: A long-sleeved brown Western style shirt, dress pants, a brown jacket, a brown belt, Western boots, a watch with a stretch band, and possibly a wedding ring.

Details of Disappearance

Uphoff was last seen in Rising City, Nebraska on October 24, 1965. He and his wife took their four young children to Shelby, Nebraska and spent the day there before returning to their home in Rising City. At 11:30 p.m. that evening, Uphoff told his wife he was returning to Shelby for a beer. He drove away in his blue and white 1954 Oldsmobile Club Coupe 88 with Nebraska license plates numbered 25-B2602 and has never been heard from again. His vehicle was never found.

Uphoff was apparently having an affair with a local woman, Jacquelyn Rains-Kracman, in 1965. He was her husband's boss. Rains-Kracman's husband went so far as to tell Uphoff's wife about the affair, although Uphoff denied the relationship existed. Rains-Kracman disappeared a month before Uphoff did and has never been heard from again.

Authorities and both families believe Rains-Kracman and Uphoff ran away together. Members of both families believe the missing couple tried to contact them in the years after 1965. In 1967, a man called Uphoff's old house and asked to speak to his wife. The caller hung up when he was told Uphoff's wife no longer lived there. That same day, someone tried to call one of Uphoff's other family members through a pay phone but they were unable to speak to one another. It has not been confirmed that either caller was Uphoff, however.

Uphoff was declared legally dead in 1972. His and Rains-Kracman's families are continuing to search for them. Their cases remain unsolved.


Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Butler County Sheriff's Office
David City Station
402-367-7400
OR
Nebraska State Patrol
402-471-4545


http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/u/uphoff_melvin.html