On July 3, 1960, police received a report of a lost child in the Red Lake area, 72 km Northwest of Kamloops. Word spread quickly in the tiny logging community that 21-month-old Edna Bette-Jean Masters had disappeared.
Bette-Jean, as her family called her, was last seen playing with family and friends at a friend’s home. An extensive search of the yard, ponds, roadways and surrounding forests produced no signs of the toddler.
The RCMP have attempted to identify and would like to speak with, a man and woman, described as being in their late twenties, who were seen in the area in a rust colored 1959 Chevrolet Car with "cat eye" or "bat wing style" tail lights with ALBERTA plates. No description of the plates was given (colour or year listed on the plated) but perhaps seeing the various license plates used in Alberta over the years could spark someone's memory.
According to an article on The Human Exception, there was only one type of car with those kinds of tail lights and that was the 1959 Chevrolet Impala. Even more specifically, these tail lights were only ever used on the 1959 model. h
Corporal Cheryl Bush said there is no evidence suggesting Bette-Jean is dead and that it is absolutely possible she may be living somewhere without knowing her past. In 2015 Kamloops RCMP released an age progression sketch of Edna Bette-Jean Masters, using photos of her, and her siblings and parents.
In 2009, the small communities surrounding Red Lake wrote a book titled "Memories of Criss Creek. Red Lake and Cooper Creek:1910-1980 or so". The author of an article covering Bette-Jean's disappearance, found a copy of this book in the special collections room of the central library in Vancouver, and shared excerpts of residents' memories of Bette-Jean's disappearance that were included in this book. Keep in mind that these memories were over 45 years old in 2009.
The community members who wrote this book describe communities so small that in 1960, the year Bette-Jean went missing, the school had 33 students in total, from all surrounding communities, across all grade levels.
One resident says about Bette-Jean, "Someone could have picked her up and taken her out. They could have gone in through Tranquille Lake, Jackson Dam, and up in that area. Different people had sightings of a biscuit coloured car with the big fins. They did a lot of car checking, but no luck."
Dorothy Anderson said, "There were cabins across the road from where the Buntings later lived that mill workers rented. This was where the little girl was lost from. They never did find her. I remember somebody from up there was coming out of town on the Tranquille Road and they had seen a car. When that car got closer to them, someone pushed somebody down in the back seat. I can't remember who it was. He didn't know of the girl's disappearance until he got back up to Red Lake."
Muriel Miller states, "Morris Masters lived in the Old Welland house and drove a logging truck up there."
***It should be noted that in these recollections, Bette-Jean's father is referred to as Morris Masters but his first name is actually Maurice**
Netia Fisher and Donna Kaiser say, "I remember a little girl about 1 - 2 years being stolen while we children played in the yard. We had all gone to someone's house, mom would know who, and a couple arrived with their little girl. We played with her inside.
A car with a man and woman arrived and talked to us. They seemed very nice but did not go in the house. The woman was holding the little girl and then left with her. I thought they knew her and it was okay. The little girl did not protest. When the couple went to leave, their little girl was gone. I remember saying she went with the man and the lady in the car but the adults never noticed the car come in."
The following information comes from page 302 of the book, but I am not sure who is providing the information. They say, "Morris Masters, the girl's father, was loading cars for us down at Copper Creek that day. She went missing from the Old Welland quarter (the Masters were living there at the time). Muskett drove our lumber truck at that particular time. We had been in Kamloops but decided to go home as we had lumber that needed to be hauled. Muskett said he would be up. We got home around noon and got things straightened around. We even met Muskett on the road taking a load of lumber down. Somebody came up at Criss Creek around 5:30 pm or so saying that a 3-year-old girl was missing.
Muskett often stopped at the Old Welland place to pick up the mother and this girl. Her little shoes would never stay on and Muskett always picked them up. She always had a baby bottle and a doll or something but they never found them either.
Muskett dropped the mother and girl off near Schimelfenig's. All the women were inside and they had just put the kettle on and made tea. Schimelfenig's son was 7 and one or two other little kids were there also, I can't remember who. They questioned the boy and questioned Muskett."
The writer of The Human Experience article got the following information from her best friend, who heard this information from her mom. Her mother got the information from her best friend, Phyllis Masters. Phyllis is Bette-Jean's younger sister, born a couple of years after Bette-Jean's disappearance. This is what Phyllis has heard from her family and friends regarding the day Bette-Jean went missing.
Alice Masters, Bette-Jean's mother, was visiting her friends, the Muskett family, in Red Lake. Alice was there with her 5-year-old son, her baby, and Bette-Jean. Alice took the baby inside to nurse, leaving Bette-Jean outside with 11-year-old Jimmy Muskett. Jimmy set Bette-Jean under a tree and ran inside for something. He noticed a distinctive car with ALBERTA license plates. When he went back outside, Bette-Jean was gone.
Maurice Masters, Bette-Jean's father, encountered the car (with the Alberta license plates that was sighted by many witnesses at the time of Bette-Jean's disappearance) on the road on the way up to meet with his family. He recalls it particularly because it was driving like a bat out of hell on the rugged logging roads.
The ALBERTA plates are suspicious to have been seen in the area as Red Lake was a small community where everyone knew everybody. Also, the only real reason to go to Red Lake was for hunting, hiking, or fishing. There were no stores or restaurants, only family homes.
Bette-Jean's 5-year-old brother refused to say anything about that day to his family at the time, and still refuses to talk about it to this day.
Although Alice and Phyllis Masters hold some suspicions about their neighbours, they believe that the couple in the car with the ALBERTA license plate took Bette-Jean.
Alice Masters says that the RCMP helped with the search effort for the first 2 weeks but then she did not hear from them again until 2013. This is when police re-opened the case as part of their review of historical cases. Alice also says that 2013 is the first time she recalls seeing a story in local papers about her daughter's disappearance. In my research for this article covering Bette-Jean Masters' disappearance, I was unable to find any newspaper articles written prior to 2013.
During the search for Bette-Jean back in 1960, police dogs tracked her scent to the road side, indicating she may have been put into a car and driven away.
At the time of her disappearance, Bette-Jean was wearing a green bonnet with white frill, an undershirt, pink short sleeve t-shirt, faded pink overalls, white socks, and sandals. She weighed about 24 pounds, with blonde fine curly hair, blue eyes, and fair complexion. She had a small oval shaped burn scar on her left arm between her elbow and shoulder, that police believe would still be visible today. Little Bette-Jean was wearing a green bonnet with white frill, pink short-sleeved T-shirt, faded pink overalls and sandals. She weighed about 11 kilograms and had curly blond hair, blue eyes and a fair complexion.
Anyone with information about this case, no matter how seemingly insignificant is asked to call Kamloops Rural RCMP at (250) 314-1800.
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