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| These photos of missing Sheila Lyon (left),13 and her younger sister, Kate Lyon, 11, were burned into Washingtonians' memories in the last nine months of 1975. |
Montgomery County's Biggest Mystery:The Lyon Sisters
It may be these missing women and attempts to grab children that is setting it off, but lately I've been thinking a lot about Montgomery County's biggest mystery: the disposition of the Lyon Sisters.
Twenty-six years ago [1975] Sheila and Kate Lyon vanished on the way home from Wheaton Plaza. Their father was John Lyon, Holy Redeemer Parishioner, member of Rosensteel Kn
ights of Columbus and radio personality at WMAL, a station then held by the owner of Channel 7 and The Washington Star. For the next several months, the girls' disappearance was the top story in the DC media, even as the U.S. was pulling out of Viet Nam.
I was graduating from the 8th grade at the time and took notice of this thing that had befallen two kids who were only a year or two younger than I was, who looked like the girls in my class. We also went to the Hot Shoppes Cafeteria in Wheaton Plaza a lot in those days and I remember the "missing" posters hanging every where one turned.
Some may have seen the incident as a shocking assault on suburban innocence, security and the "good ol' days," but I remember many, myself included, thinking that it had been inevitable. It had all started with hippies. Then there were the Beltway Murders. It had to happen to somebody some time.
Word of suspicious adults accosting children came around much more often, it seems, than it does now. A couple of times late in my grade-school career, there were warnings to look out for guys who had been hailing kids near the school. One was given the handle "Charlie Icepick." I was told never to walk home on the lonely "trolley path," an old right-of-way that cuts through neighborhoods east of Old G'town Road.
The Lyon Sisters were last seen on Drumm Avenue walking toward the family house on Plyers Mill Rd. As had other kids at Wheaton Plaza that March afternoon, they had talked to a well-dressed, middle-aged man who appeared to be interviewing children with a tape-recorder in a briefcase. No one has ever identified this man. He never came forward in the media saturation that followed the disappearance, so it's a good bet he was involved. I don't ever recall seeing any reports of what he was discussing with the children.
The Montgomery County Police, believe it or not, have a suspect, an old man incarcerated for life in North Carolina for crime against children. He appeared in the DC area about the time the girls vanished. However, some legal obstacle prevents--or protects-- the creep from being questioned.
Wheaton Plaza, in the open air in 1975, has since been enclosed and is now a really scary dump. John Lyon has given up broadcasting and has become a victim assistance counsellor. His eldest son, the last family member to see Sheila and Kate alive, is a Montgomery County Police Officer.
Photo is of John Lyon (left) with other WMAL personality Jack Weaver. Taken by Neal Conway in 1985
WUSA Channel 9’s Cold Case page about
the Lyon Sisters
Copyright © 2001, 2003 by Neal J. Conway. All rights reserved.