New York Times – August 10, 1973 Friday. (rough record that I could get not the exact copy).
Voice of a very scared boy on August the 9th resumed broadcasting on the citizen’s band radio frequency in foothills of Central NM: searches say they they are closing in on area where 7-year-old is believed to be lost in fathers pick up truck; boy, who says his first name is Larry, told rescuers on August 8th that he and his father were in an accident and that his father is dead. 3 pilots reported sighting truck in Red Rock Canyon area on east side of Manzano Mountains, south-east of Albuquerque. Helicopter is dispatched to area; Army search plan had monitored transmission from the body during the night that left searchers to the hills. Sgt W A Schmidt says searchers lost contact with boy for several hours and presume that he had either gone to sleep, or the battery had gone dead. They have not discounted it as a hoax. Over 150 people were out with radio’s and directional finders on the foothills.
My notes collected from around and musings on this matter? It seems quite a few felt it was a hoax at the end as nothing ever came of it, but some were quite concerned that if it was not they had, in effect, stopped looking for a dying and trapped boy.
The search went on from the 8th-10th and then on the 11th it seems one rescuer pilot found a boy in distress on the radio called David. The searchers started to worry that it was a hoax and queried that the battery was somehow going. That same day a Missouri family out on the west is reported missing and they also have a son named Larry.
August 12th an army sergeant claimed he had spoken to the boy for three hours, but he state police were unable to very the claim. The missing family were located on this day. The CB Larry gave very little details about who he was but if he was a panicked child it might well be harder for him to articulate.
On the 13th the search was called off, the last transmission was traced to a boy with a walkie-talkie in Phoenix and it’s thought he was a copycat that had heard the story and finally by the 24th the police felt there was nothing more to do and they had no evidence the situation was even real at all.
Then on 25th August a family from Toledo, Ohio were reported as having been missing for several weeks. Their son, Larry, was said to be familiar with walkie-talkies. At that point the police chief said there was not enough to go by to restart searches and four days later the Ohio family were also found.
If the hoax train of thought is still in play then maybe a report from NBC Evening News from that time would go into support of this. On August 27th 1973 it was said the rescue teams were on a wild goose chase as a man from Denver claimed to have been reponsible.
The 9th August, Fairbanks Daily News-Miner gave more details to Larry’s supposed plight, a California radio operator received the transmission saying he was in a red and white pick up, it had overturned and both doors were jammed. The boy claimed his father collapsed at the wheel whilst taking him on a rabbit hunting trip. The search narrowed to the Manzano as an Albuquerque radio operator suggested that it was in that area of New Mexico.
So California to New Mexico is around 770ish miles, Ohio family from New Mexico is 1320ish miles and the variation from New Mexico is 810ish miles. On the usual radio channels without ‘skipping’ the transmissions are local to 1-18 miles and base stations from 5-10 to mobile, with 10-30 miles for base to base.
Skipping, firstly it’s illegal to practise the art of skipping. A normal CB uses short range, there are times when the earth’s atmosphere acts as a mirror and bounces the signal. This may happen by accident and can work for thousands of miles but trying to force the bounce/skip is an offence. However, if the story is true then Californian reception by accident may have occurred.
So what can I conclude? Having spoken to some friends on the CB front (or HAM Radio) it seems that what may have started out as a prank became so much more. I pray my conclusion of hoax is correct as I’d rather that than the idea of a child trapped in a lorry, lost and left because of a power failure/battery drain.
Investigations into the unknown and weird 