Pulling off a successful vanishing act is an unusual and difficult task - especially
if you’re a public figure of any variety.
You’d think it would be impossible for a noteworthy celebrity to seemingly disappear
into thin air -- but, as these missing celebrities have proven, anything can happen.
If there’s one thing to be learned from these missing celebs, it’s that no one is
too talented, popular, or successful to completely fall off the grid.
Here’s a look at some of the most mysterious cases of missing celebrities.
Richey Edwards
If Lord Byron, Sid Vicious, and a moody teenager procreated, their spawn would probably look
and act a whole lot Manic Street Preachers' rhythm guitarist and lyricist Richey Edwards
- a mid-1990s British rock idol.
Edwards was handsome, moody, and dreamy, with a talent for writing lyrics about depression,
and an even bigger talent for disturbing publicity stunts.
When a journalist with a music magazine implied his band's posturing was insincere, Edwards
grabbed a razor blade and carved "4 REAL" into his own arm.
When he first went missing, in February 1995, it could've just been another chapter in his
twin stories of self-destruction and self-promotion.
However, things took a turn for the worse when it quickly became apparent that the young
poet was gone for good.
After he disappeared from his hotel room, Edwards’ car was later found abandoned near
the Severn Bridge.
Edwards was legally declared dead in 2008, but his body has never been found.
Connie Converse
A 1950s musician, Connie Converse is now considered the first modern singer-songwriter, crooning
intimate, lyrical ballads suffused with melancholy at a time well before Bob Dylan had made his
mark.
However, her contemporaries were not aware of how groundbreaking Connie was, and in 1961,
she quit music altogether - virtually unknown and convinced she was a failure.
In 1974, Converse wrote to her friends that she was going to make a fresh start, loaded
up her car, and drove off into the sunset, never to be heard from again.
No trace of her has ever surfaced, and it’s generally thought Converse fell victim to harm.
Even sadder?
Converse rose to popularity in 2009 when a handful of her songs were released on an album
called How Sad, How Lovely.
Unfortunately, Converse saw none of this success.
Jim Sullivan
If Jim Sullivan's name isn't ringing any bells, that's because he's the definition of a cult
artist.
A folk-rocker who was part of the LA scene in the '60s and early '70s, Sullivan cut just
two records before disappearing.
In March 1975, Sullivan was heading to Nashville for what was meant to be his big break.
His car was found abandoned in the desert outside Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
His wallet, clothes, and guitar were all found in a nearby motel, but there was no trace
of Sullivan himself.
According to a friend, Sullivan would've never left his guitar behind if he planned to vanish.
Appropriately for a dude who released a record called UFO - which featured lyrics about driving
into the desert and being abducted by aliens - one of the more prominent theories is that
he was - you guessed it - abducted by aliens.
Rico Harris
In the year 2000, Rico Harris was on top of the world.
He was playing basketball for the world-famous Harlem Globetrotters, and before that, he'd
been a Top 100 college basketball recruit.
But drinking kept him from reaching his potential, and he wound up out of basketball and began
working as a security guard in LA.
The final blow came in 2014 when he was fired for drunkenness.
He left his mom's Los Angeles home to drive to Seattle and stay with his girlfriend, but
his car was later found abandoned outside Sacramento.
Sources close to Harris confirmed he was known for disappearing for days on end, but this
time he was in a weird mental state.
A backpack and phone were found on the roadside, but Rico Harris was nowhere to be found.
Days after Harris vanished, people were phoning in sightings of a giant person walking alongside
State Route 16.
Footprints were found in sand - but there was no sign of Harris.
The LA Times suggests he was probably picked up as a hitchhiker.
After that… who knows?
Jim Thompson
Jim Thompson is arguably the most famous American to have ever lived in Thailand.
A former agent in the Office for Strategic Services, Thompson moved to Thailand at the
end of World War II.
He set up a silk business, single-handedly turning Thai silk into a global commodity,
and he was known to be a socialite, throwing huge parties for Bangkok's rich.
In 1967, Thompson left Bangkok for a hiking trip in Malaysia.
He set up camp in a bungalow, went on an afternoon walk, and never came back.
Though Thompson was a soldier with field experience and the wherewithal to survive in the wilderness,
he’d also made many enemies throughout his illustrious career, from competing businesses
to the CIA, any one of whom would benefit from his disappearing.
It’s almost like a real-life game of Clue.
Scott Smith
Canadian band Loverboy was one of the biggest rock bands of the early '80s with hard-charging
hits like "Hot Girls in Love" and "Working for the Weekend.”
Scott Smith was a founding member, staying with the group all the way until his mysterious
and frightening disappearance at sea on November 30th, 2000.
After playing with his band in Vancouver, Smith and his friends set out for Mexico on
a 37-foot sailboat.
As they sailed down the coast and neared San Francisco, the weather got rough.
A 20-foot wave knocked Smith off the deck of the vessel and into the water.
Coast Guard helicopters arrived within 20 minutes and dispatched two search boats, which
scoured a 133-square-mile area, to no avail.
Smith’s remains have never surfaced.
Barbara Newhall Follett
Prepare to feel like an underachiever.
Barbara Newhall Follett was a Jazz Age writing prodigy who published her first novel at age
12.
That novel was The House Without Windows - a mega-complex work that won rave reviews in
the New York Times.
Everyone who read the book agreed Follett was going to be the next great American writer.
But after putting out just two novels, Follet was forced to give up writing when her father
suddenly ran off with a younger woman, leaving Follett and her mother penniless.
By age 16, Follett was working as a typist and fending for herself.
She never wrote again.
In 1939, at just 26 years old, Follet had an argument with her husband and left the
house.
She never returned, and no trace of her was ever found.
Her husband barely bothered to look for her, and her mother reportedly didn't discover
her daughter was missing until 1952.
Even stranger is the fact that the press wasn't alerted until 1966.
By then, they were probably asking, "Barbara who?"