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On the morning of October 24, 1961, Martin Risch left for Logan Airport to catch an early flight for an overnight business trip in Manhattan. Later that afternoon, the police were called out to his family home in Lincoln, Massachusetts.  A neighbor reported that the Risch’s 4-year-old daughter, Lillian, had returned from a playdate after finding the kitchen covered in blood. Her mother, Joan, was nowhere to be seen, but her 2-year-old brother was safe in his bed.

Join us at the quiet end for Vanished in Blood. After Joan Risch was reported missing, there was speculation throughout the country about what could have happened to this wealthy young mother and homemaker. Early theories were that she had staged her death to escape a life she no longer wanted, that she had undergone a botched abortion, or that she had been assaulted, abducted, and murdered. Today we’re going over the events of October 14, 1961, as well as the years before and the years since Joan’s mysterious disappearance.

Sources

A Kitchen Painted in Blood by Stephen H. Ahern

Joan Carolyn Risch, The Charley Project, ret. 10/4/2023, https://charleyproject.org/case/joan-carolyn-risch

The Mysterious Disappearance of Joan Risch, The Grunge, Jennifer Deutschmann, 2/15/2022, ret. 10/2/2023 https://www.grunge.com/768932/the-mysterious-disappearance-of-joan-risch-explained/