Bradford Bishop and Trenny Gibson: Both Associated with Smoky Mountains National Park in 1976

By: Shane Lambert

Original time of writing: November 27th, 2024
Minor update: January 22nd, 2025

I was reading about Bradford Bishop tonight, a man who spent much time on the FBI's Top Ten Most Wanted list. He is no longer on this list but that does not mean he was apprehended. He may remain at large at the time of writing but he would be at a very advanced age at this point if he was still alive. FBI images of Bishop are below, taken from their official website.

In this article, I will associate Bradford Bishop's known timeline with another unsolved mystery, Trenny Gibson's disappearance. Trenny is a missing person who disappeared as a teenager back in 1976. Her last-known location was not too far from Bradford Bishop's last-known location. There is a time gap to be aware of but I think the two cases should be thought of together.

Bishop allegedly killed five family members on March 1st, 1976. Even though his alleged crimes are almost fifty years old, he does still make the news occasionally. For instance, People.com published a piece on him as recently as December 2024 (Author: Christine Pelisek). A woman, who knew she was adopted, found out that she was Bishop's child.

After Bishop allegedly killed his five family members, his vehicle was found abandoned in Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee on March 18th, 1976. According to an episode of The Infographics Show (cited at the end), Bishop left dog biscuits in the car, a shotgun, an ax, a bloody blanket, and a shaving kit with his medication.

Bishop was considered an avid outdoorsman and both a camping and hiking enthusiast. Perhaps in agreement with this, his car was found in the park at an abandoned campground seventeen days after allegedly killing his family members. 

In my opinion, that his vehicle was found at an abandoned campground suggests that Bishop's short-term plans to elude authorities involved hiding in remote wilderness locations. That opinion has shaped a lot of what I write below. 

Trenny Gibson: Missing From Smoky Mountains National Park Since October 1976

While reading about Bishop, I wondered for a moment why I had a familiarity with Smoky Mountains National Park. I have never been there. Then I recalled that this was the park that Trenny Gibson had gone missing from. 

I wrote about her five years ago after reading about her case at a time when I was focusing on missing people and hiking trails. Gibson went missing on October 8th, 1976 while on a school field trip that involved hiking in Smoking Mountains National Park. As of the time of writing (November 27th, 2024), she is still missing.

Trenny also makes the news occasionally. WATE.com profiled her case in October 2024 (Hope McAlee).

There were just under seven months between March 18th, 1976 (the day Bishop's car was found), and October 8th, 1976 (the date Trenny went missing). That's a huge gap of time to associate the two respective events, the discovery of Bishop's station wagon and the date of Gibson's disappearance. 

However, Bishop was an avid hiker, camper, and outdoorsman. 

Furthermore, presuming that he killed his five family members (as commonly assumed), he would have had a massive motive to hide from the law -- permanently. It is thought that Bishop blended in with the hikers in the area in the immediate aftermath of abandoning his vehicle.

For almost certain, Bishop would want to move away from his vehicle, knowing it would be a lead for the authorities as they searched for him. One has to wonder if he used whatever resources he had to set up a long-term camp in the national park in March 1976. However, a credible sighting of the wanted man was not made until some time later.

Bishop Seen in Sweden

The first credible sighting of Bradford Bishop after the deaths of his family members happened in July 1978, when someone who knew him claimed she saw him in Stockholm, Sweden. Admittedly, there is a big gap between the date of his station wagon's discovery in March 1976 and July 1978. But he could have stayed in the park for several months as there is no proof that he was anywhere else until more than two years later.

Could Bradford Bishop have kidnapped Trenny Gibson? The connection between Gibson and Bishop might be called tenuous. Certain things line up but not like a line of dominoes.

The scenario that I would like to suggest starts with Bishop preparing for a life on the lam after March 1st, 1976. This much is assumed about him by those who have written about his case.

We know that he ditched his car near Elkmont in March 1976. Then it's thought that he blended in with the hikers as he moved away from the station wagon. At this point, he would have little choice but to use his avid outdoorsman skills to hide in the park from authorities. This was not someone who could simply re-enter his life: in fact, if the allegations against him are true the statutes on the crimes will never expire.

Trenny Gibson: Missing While Hiking Separate From Her Classmates

When Trenny Gibson went missing, she was on a school excursion but she was hiking separately from her classmates. That she may have fallen on a difficult section of the trail has been suggested. It's a scenario that can't be discounted, even though she was never found despite a serious search. But many thought that she may have been lured and abducted. Some sources say that her scent was tracked to a roadside location, where it disappeared.

If Bradford Bishop was still in the park, he clearly had the nerve to commit an abduction. Furthermore, that he may still have been in the park cannot just be brushed aside. His car was found there and his alleged crimes were so major that he could likely never be free again if found, giving him a motive to hide out long term. Also, he had the outdoor skills and intelligence to survive as a camper long term.

What I think can be stated for certain is that he might have been in the area of Trenny Gibson on the day she disappeared. Also, Bishop, if the allegations against him are true, was capable of felonious acts.

On the other hand, one could argue that it would actually be stupid for Bishop to abduct Gibson. The ensuing search for her might simply reveal his own hiding spot. I think this is a counterpoint that needs to be addressed. 

In my opinion, if Bishop has anything to do with Gibson's disappearance, then it might just be from an accidental encounter. Trenny Gibson, for part of the school trip, had hiked alongside her classmates. My thoughts on her disappearance have always been that she chose to hike alone for a short time for one unflattering reason: she was planning to urinate off of the trail and didn't want any of her classmates around. Maybe, like the rest of us, she was a critic of outhouses.

When someone urinates near a hiking trail, I think they usually choose to go 10 to 20 yards away from the trail for privacy's sake. There's not much need to go much further. In the past, I've thought that Trenny simply picked an unlucky spot to do this with some kind of transient lurking not too far off of the trail. 

In this scenario, I wonder if that hypothetical transient was none other than Bradford Bishop. He's on the lam, he can't rejoin society, and his car was found in the park earlier in the year. If Trenny Gibson found his hiding spot while venturing 20 yards off the trail, then his motive for disappearing her is immense. Also, he would realize it's time to move on with search parties coming to look for her.

It is not that hard to explain why such search parties would not find his camp. I've worked on enough missing person cases to know that phrases like "we left no stone unturned" or "we scoured the area" are often fluff. You have to add the phrase "within budget" to each statement to form something true.

The Infographics Show and Bradford Bishop

Bradford Bishop's fight from justice was covered in an episode of The Infographics Show. In the episode, they include what was found in the car.

D.B. Cooper Mystery - YouTube Videos Recount Hijacking Details, Speculates on Identity

By: Shane Lambert

The 50th anniversary of the D.B. Cooper mystery came and went in November of 2021. One of the great "whodunit" mysteries from the last century is from a plane highjacking in 1971.

The FBI has yet to solve the mystery and they don't seem to be too active in cracking this case at this point, one that they closed in 2016. D.B. Cooper, as the individual who hijacked the plane was called, remains the only person to hijack an airplane in the United States of America and not get caught.

Presumed likeness to D.B. Cooper.

If you asked me, the sketch of D.B. Cooper looks a lot like a man who used to be on the FBI's Top Ten Most Wanted list, a man known as Bradford Bishop. But besides likeness and similar ages, there's nothing else to go on, except that Bradford Bishop certainly had the nerve to commit a felony. 

Bradford Bishop. Still wanted by the FBI at the time of writing for five counts of first-degree murder.

Don't get too excited about the remote possibility of Bishop being Cooper. From what I read, Bishop was in Italy in 1971. Also, the case of D.B. Cooper reminds me of the case of Jack the Ripper in one way: that is, so many people have been named as potentially being the unknown criminals that it's hard to take any one of them seriously without something really convincing being laid out first.

A couple thoughts I've had on the D.B. Cooper case have to do with the point in space where Cooper jumped from the plane and the ransom money that was recovered. Regarding the jumping point, I wondered if it was hard to determine because the plane was relatively empty. I will elaborate on this.

Cooper was on a flight from Seattle to Reno when he jumped out of the back of the plane he highjacked. If you are flying from Seattle to Reno with a full load of passengers then you probably will get different flight times compared to flying with a plane-load of passengers because the weight of hundreds of passengers affects the weight of the plane.

I wonder if the plane that Cooper hijacked, which had only him and four crew members, flew a lot faster than a plane that would otherwise have had full occupancy. It only stands to reason that it would and I wondered if this made the point where he jumped harder to pinpoint since flight times along the same route might not have been trustworthy for measuring times.

Cooper Lost Some of His Ransom Money: Proves He Was Under Major Duress

Also, I don't think that Cooper would have parted with his ransom money without one hell of a fight. That he lost $5880, arguably during his fall, could be taken to mean that he was in great duress while he attempted to negotiate a safe parachuting landing, He was up against gravity, the darkness of night, the uncertainty of the elements, and the terrain of his uncertain landing spot.

With 50 years now gone since that night when he highjacked the plane, perhaps this is a crime that will become more for the historian than someone interested in justice. If he survived the fall, he could easily be dead from old age now. 

The Infographics Show did an episode on DB Cooper on September 4th, 2022. Their top suspect is Richard McCoy (Jr.). 

There's another pretty good half-hour upload on Youtube that deals with this mystery embedded below. I watched it tonight and felt like there wasn't much 'fluff' in the program. It comes from LEMMiNO and it was an informative and inquisitive recounting of the events surrounding the highjacking, complete with guesses as to who D.B. Cooper might have been. At the time of writing, the video had over 11 million views and nearly 500 "likes" attesting to decent quality. The video is embedded below and it is recommended viewing for anyone interested in this "true crime" event.