Shirley Jane Rose was nine when she left her grandparents’ home on the evening of Friday, October 17, 1975, to walk the eight blocks to her Springfield, Missouri, home. She was reported missing by her mother, Joyce Rose, at 7:43 p.m. that night after failing to arrive; witnesses later said they had seen her speaking with a man in a blue Chevrolet on Scenic Avenue.Between the initial search and December 13, 1975, the community and police followed leads that produced no answers. Two men searching near McDaniel Lake found a shallow grave that day; the remains were identified as Shirley’s.

Her blouse had been knotted around her neck and, because of advanced decomposition, no precise cause of death could be determined, though evidence suggested strangulation.Several suspects and persons of interest were questioned over the years. A 1982 disclosure by a Greene County judge relayed a dying client’s alleged confession that Shirley had been kidnapped in a drug dispute, forced to watch her own grave being dug, and strangled; attorney-client privilege protected the client’s identity.

No charges have been filed and the case remains unsolved.Does anyone have information about Shirley’s route that October evening or the blue Chevrolet seen on Scenic Avenue?