By: Shane Lambert
Original time of writing: February 18th, 2018
Tonight I looked at the mysterious case of Beverly Sharpman, an individual who was last seen on September 11th, 1947 in Philadelphia. NamUs has her listed as 16 years old at the time of her disappearance. However, all the newspaper articles I looked at indicated that she was 17 years old at the time. Generally, she is reported as 17 years old, which has always meant that she is a missing child.
Exploring the Enigma of Beverly Sharpman’s Disappearance
The case stands out to me because of the huge effort that individuals in Beverly's family made, especially her mother Nettie, in attempting to find her. Furthermore, I'm not convinced that Beverly Sharpman died at a time close to her disappearance.
Lastly, I'm not convinced that the love that Beverly's family felt for her was entirely reciprocal. My opinion in this cloudy case is that Beverly disappeared voluntarily.
Have a look at the photograph below. The face from this photograph is commonly used as the missing-person's photograph of Beverly. I think there might be a clue in the entire photo, a matter that I will return to.
"Got married. Leaving town. Will not be back. Don't worry. Babe."
For now, let's review the details of the case.
On September 11th, 1947, Beverly Sharpman enrolled for her senior year of high school (Overbrook High School). Later that day, her parents received a telegram. The telegram said: "Got married. Leaving town. Will not be back. Don't worry. Babe" (Babe is her nickname).
Unveiling the Truth Behind Beverly Sharpman’s Mysterious Telegram and Last Known Location
The message may seem cold in the sense that it appears to lack sensitivity for the questions that might arise from such an announcement. However, the message is inherently thoughtful as well. The simple fact that it was sent indicates that Beverly cared enough about those that she was leaving the company of to not leave them completely in the dark as to her plans.
She did not disappear into thin air and her last sighting, according to Doenetwork, was the train station above where she was spotted with luggage. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Station in Philadelphia no longer exists; it closed in 1960 and was demolished thereafter. But if the train station sighting is accurate, then it would be her last known location (modern Google Maps).
However, if you read the snippet above very carefully, one I took from the April 28th, 1948 issue of The Philadelphia Inquirer (Page 29), it doesn't say that Beverly was seen there. What it says was that she was "last heard from" (emphasis added) at the station.
Did Beverly Sharpman Send the Telegram, or Was It a Diversion Tactic by an Abductor?
In my opinion, it's not 100% clear that she actually sent the telegram herself. They were typed messages back then, and it may be possible that the telegram was sent by someone who abducted her to mislead an investigation. Sending a telegram from a train station might be like the trick some abductors use, where they park the missing person's car at an airport.
That possibility acknowledged that scenario is not the one I believe in. I will also state that in much of the journalism, it's taken for granted that she sent the message herself.
One article that I read at the time around her disappearance stated she had withdrawn $150 from her bank account. The interesting point is that she had to give one week's notice in order to make such a withdrawal. That suggested advanced planning of her disappearance to me.
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| The Philadelphia Inquirer, March 13th 1949, Page 114 |
High school enrollment a red herring?
One question that could be raised is why did she enroll in high school in the morning if she was skipping town and not coming back in the evening? That does seem odd but then it could be that she didn't want to tip off that anything was amiss.
It could be that she behaved as normally as possible until she was ready to leave: not registering for high school might have raised some eyebrows. Schools get their funding from enrollment size, so if she isn't there, then maybe someone calls her home to find out why she wasn't.
Furthermore, it just might be that she wasn't 100% committed to leaving or that she wasn't sure how long she'd be gone with certainty. Enrolling in high school so that she could attend if she decided to return in the months ahead might have been a scenario in her mind.
Decoding the Tense of Beverly Sharpman’s Telegram: Was She Already Married When She Disappeared?
But something that should not be overlooked is the changing tense of her short message. I found one somewhat-modern article on the case that stated that Beverly Sharpman was eloping.
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| Philadelphia Daily News, February 29th 2008, by Dana DiFilippo |
Those researching this case should be aware of the tense of her statements.
- "Got married." Past tense.
- "Leaving town." Present tense.
- "Will not be back." Future tense.
If we take the telegram message at face value, then she was not "leaving home to marry" or "running away to get married" but was already married when she left. That is a point that can't be overlooked: at the time of her disappearance this girl was married.
The Missing Marriage Certificate: Could It Be the Smoking Gun in Beverly Sharpman’s Disappearance?
The matter is an enormous one in this case, for reasons that I will get back to. However, what is gigantic about this case is simply that her marriage certificate has eluded everyone -- and lots of people have looked for it.
Even in the modern age of Internet searching and searchable databases like Ancestry.com -- where name searches scour countless records in less than a minute -- no one has ever been able to find her marriage certificate. If you can find it, then it would be a massive feather in your cap.
Yet, one oddity with her getting married is that it is hard to picture how she could have done it without parental consent. She was 17 years old at the time of her disappearance. In my review of marriage certificates in Philadelphia from the summer of 1947, I found that there were cases where 18-year-olds (legal adults) still needed parental consent for marriage.
However, the fact remains that Beverly Sharpman's note says she "Got married." That is past tense, meaning she was married the moment she boarded the train. I think if she was married the moment she left town, then she might have done it under a fake name -- somehow.
Mother Placed Numerous Classified Ads
The mother, as part of a fierce effort to find her daughter, placed numerous classified ads under the "Missing Persons" columns of newspapers. These messages at first were directed toward her daughter directly.
Later, they were directed towards anyone with information on her location. At another time, they communicated forgiveness. In one peculiar ad, the mother said that she needed a sample of Beverly's handwriting.
The request for a card in her handwriting comes after Nettie received a card that may have been from Beverly, a break in the case that didn't yield any further clues that I found. But the fact of the matter is that the classified ads appealed to Beverly Sharpman directly or to anyone that knew of her. I would like the reader to consider the following.
Why Classified Ads Failed to Find Beverly Sharpman: The Critical Challenge of Her Married Name Change
If someone put your name, the reader's (imagine this personally), into a classified ad then what chance is there that you would read it? Surely, we've all looked through the classifieds but, unless it's your hobby, many days might pass by between your glances at these pages in the paper.
What's more likely: that you discover for yourself that someone is looking for you using the classifieds or that someone else who knows you reads your name and directs your attention to such an ad?
I think the latter is more likely and therein lies the problem with finding Beverly Sharpman using classified ads to appeal to her: anyone that knows her after she left home will probably know her by her new married name, not Beverly Sharpman.
Where is "Beverly (nee Sharpman)," new last name unknown?
On that matter, I made an attempt to search keywords using "Beverly (nee Sharpman)" and its variants such as just "(nee Sharpman)" or "B. (nee Sharpman)" in hopes of finding anyone, in 1947 or thereafter, described as such. The term "nee" for those that don't know refers to birth names. After Beverly got married and moved on to a new life, no one would know that she was Beverly Sharpman.
The classifieds do contain some case clues. The promise to keep information confidential is interesting: it recognizes that Beverly may have had some secrets. It's known that Beverly wanted to talk to her mother about something shortly before she, Beverly, disappeared. However, ultimately, she was not able to open up.
At the DoeNetwork page for this case the following statements are made: "On September 10, 1947 Beverly told her mother she had something to tell her. Beverly seemed troubled, her mother later told police. Nettie Sharpman went to make tea and did not pressure her daughter to reveal her secret. And Beverly, apparently reconsidering, later went to bed without confiding her concerns."
What it sounds like to me is that Beverly married someone that her parents wouldn't approve of, maybe she was pregnant by him, and she couldn't bring herself to tell them.
Maybe she married a man who was a member of a race that her parents or circles wouldn't approve of. Society was a lot less open in 1947 then it is today.
Maybe she married a man who was 30 years her senior. Maybe she married a man who was a member of the communist party. Maybe she married a man who was the 'wrong' race, that was 30 years her senior, and a member of the communist party. Again, maybe she was pregnant and pregnant as a minor by an older man.
Classified Ads Could Have Deepened Beverly Sharpman’s Family Rift
The one classified ad that jumps out to me is the following one:
If you read that message from a loved one, then how would you feel? Reassured that you could re-enter a relationship knowing that bygones were bygones?
Well, what if you didn't think you'd done a thing wrong in the first place? Forgiveness over a matter where you felt you shouldn't be blamed might just reaffirm some kind of gap between yourself and the person or persons you had interpersonal troubles with.
My inclination is that Beverly left in good health and on her own volition. That she planned to depart is clear based on the combination of the telegram attesting to that and the bank withdrawal that had to be planned in advance. That withdrawal is not something someone else could have done for her.
After September 11th, 1947, she had a different name than Beverly Sharpman, whether legally or just one that she lived under. I think those working on this case should focus on someone named Beverly with a maiden name of Sharpman. But it's possible that she had an entire assumed name and that's all.
Furthermore, I think that focusing on Jane Does may prove fruitless. They have a DNA sample of Beverly, according to NamUs. If she is a Jane Doe then the computer matching systems for DNA profiles will do that work.
Looking back at the photo
When I look at the photo that was posted at the top, I have many questions. I think anyone working on this case should try to find information on the photo.
Focusing only on her face, it is the one used to disseminate information about her likeness to the general public. For that purpose, family and authorities would want a recent photo to be used. For that reason, we can be sure that the photo below was one of the last-known photos of her.
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| Note: she was 17 years old at time of disappearance. |
Specifically, who was the cordial man that lent his jacket to keep her warm? Did she lean to the left to get close to him or was she just not sure about the edge of the camera's scope? Do I see an abnormality in the right ring finger? I wonder if she is wearing a ring in the picture and what for. When I focus only on the hands and use enhancements, the abnormality is much clearer. Why does her NamUs profile say she wore no jewelry when it looks to me that she did wear a ring?
I spoke to my grandma, who was born in 1923 and remembers the 1940s vividly, about where women wore wedding rings or promise rings or engagement rings. She insisted that they were worn on the left hand. However, she did say that it depended on which country you were from with some European cultures wearing them on the right hand. Maybe she married a European man and wearing a ring on her right hand was his culture, a practice that would also hide their relationship in North America. Perhaps related, one 'Lee Davis' of Fairless Hills or Levittown was named as an author of a letter in 1954. The letter urged the police to contact foreign police regarding this case.
In conclusion, "Beverly (nee Sharpman) [last name after marriage unknown]" may be dead now. But I do think she lived after September 11th, 1947. The problem is that everyone looking for Beverly Sharpman could be on a wild-goose chase: if she "got married," as her message said, then who knows what her last name actually is.
I'll continue to look for someone named Beverly or Bev or Babe with a maiden name of Sharpman. When it comes to keyword searching in newspaper databases to see if the keywords appear anywhere in the United States after her disappearance date, that brings about dozens of possible permutations that I can think of - so any help would be appreciated.
I also don't have access to tons of search engines for newspapers, so anyone else that does could help: don't look for "Beverly Sharpman" but look for someone named Beverly with an association to a maiden name of Sharpman. Also, don't hesitate to look outside of the USA, just in case that is an engagement ring on her right hand under European customs.
This is a case that is ice cold. However, it also made the mainstream news on many occasions over the decades. She was among a host of missing people for an article that focused on Pennsylvania's missing children. But that goes back to 2016 now.
Weird Communication From a Reader at My Blog, Missing Persons Commentary
I always thought that this communication was weird:
People who post online under random usernames aren't credible. However, it's food for thought. I don't like it when people do such things, especially since she ghosted my response.
Possible communication in 1954
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| This letter had the name "Lee Davis" associated to it. I found no follow-up articles on the matter. |
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