| 3/9/2009 11:16:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article |
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| MISSING PERSONS — After 29 years as an unsolved case, the August 1980 kidnapping and murder of Timothy Hack and Kelly Drew is being revisited by the state Department of Justice Division of Criminal Justice “cold case” unit. Above, a “missing persons” poster is on the bulletin board at the former Citizens State Bank in Fort Atkinson (Badger Bank) in 1980. — Union photo by Chris Spangler. |
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Fort teens' killer still
mystery 29 years later
By Ryan Whisner
Regional Editor
HEBRON - "Kidnapped and slain."
Those three words, engraved on their headstone, memorialize Tim Hack and Kelly Drew, who disappeared from a wedding reception at the Concord House on Aug. 9, 1980.
The 19-year-old Fort Atkinson High School sweethearts had arranged to meet friends at Fort Fest after attending the dance, but never showed up. Tim's brown 1977 Oldsmobile remained parked at the Concord House, his jacket, checkbook, wallet and $67 it contained still locked inside.
Nearly three months later, their bodies were found at the edge of the woods off Hustisford Road east of Watertown. Authorities said the bodies were too badly decomposed to determine the cause of death.
No weapons were found. Their murderer has never been identified.
After 29 years as an unsolved case, the kidnapping and murder has become part of the local folklore. Local residents still trade theories about what happened.
The families, and community, would like to see this case solved, but as the years pass, the likelihood of that happening grows more remote.
New hope recently surfaced as the state Department of Justice Division of Criminal Justice "cold case" unit is revisiting the case, bringing it back to the forefront.
In conjunction with the state taking another look at the case, WMTV 15 (NBC 15 Madison) is kicking off a series of reports on cold cases under investigation at the state level, with a story on the Hack-Drew murders tonight during the 10 p.m. news broadcast (see related stories on page 1).
A number of unexpected factors brought Kelly and Tim to the Concord House unaccompanied on Aug. 9, 1980, the day they disappeared. Tim's invitation actually was a last-minute plan, the families have said.
He originally had planned to accompany his family to church and head to the wedding from there. Running late, Tim had sent them on to evening Mass alone, saying he would attend church in the morning, and then called Kelly to invite her to the reception.
Kelly had been expecting to meet friends at Fort Fest, and only agreed to attend the reception if they returned to Fort Atkinson to meet up with her friends after the dance around 11:30 p.m.
Meanwhile, after experiencing car problems and some misdirection as to where the reception was being held, the rest of the Hack family decided not to go. Instead, they met Tim and Kelly in Sullivan to pass along their wedding card.
Concord House itself was somewhat off-the-beaten-path and the location of the bodies were found - on a locally-known "lover's lane" - was even more so, at least for a stranger. The area was isolated then, although today, there are several houses along the road.
A check of the wedding registry and gifts from Concord House later showed the couple had made it to the reception, but no one saw them after 11 p.m., when friends said they saw Tim and Kelly head for the door.
The next morning, the families began to worry when they called each other to check where their son and daughter were.
Immediately, they called the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department, but the official 24-hour wait for reporting a missing person had not yet passed.
Kelly's brother, Brett, an Edgerton police officer, was not waiting. Once he heard they were missing, he drove to the Concord House and found Tim's car locked, in the parking lot.
The families swung into action, tracking down the guestbooks from the two wedding receptions held at the Concord House that night, borrowing telephone directories from the Dwight Foster Public Library in Fort Atkinson and setting out to call all 600 names in the registries.
The hope was that someone at the wedding might remember something.
Ground searches began on Monday, the second day after the couple disappeared. On the first day of the search, 15 volunteers combed the area on horseback and 20 on foot. For several days, the search expanded, with more people volunteering on foot, by plane and by helicopter.
The search for Hack and Drew was one of the largest manhunts ever conducted in the State of Wisconsin.
Volunteers from all area police and fire departments and others joined in the search, which went on all day, every day, for the duration.
Neighbors and area businesses contributed coolers full of food and helped with the chores so the Hack farm, located along County Highway D in Hebron, could continue to run as usual.
No one knew yet, but the yellow pants Kelly had been wearing already had been found nearby on County Highway B, between Farmington and Johnson Creek, but they were not identified until the truck driver who had spotted them alongside the road heard about the disappearance, and matched the clothing with the description the families had given. Her purse also was found in the area, near County Highway P.
Eventually, much of the teenagers' clothing showed up, most of it in ditches. One of Tim's shoes was found in a hay bale that had traveled from Jefferson County to Central Wisconsin.
Finally, on Oct. 19, two squirrel hunters from Milwaukee discovered Kelly's body at the edge of the woods bordering a cornfield. The next day, investigators found Tim's body, approximately 100 feet away in the field.
The bodies were discovered eight miles from Concord and three miles beyond the area search earlier by authorities and volunteers.
Community members remembered both Kelly and Tim as generous, honest, small-town people secure in their Christian faith, optimistically working toward their future.
A budding agribusinessman, Tim got his driver's license at 15 and did some cross-state hauling jobs. He recently had purchased $100,000 in farm machinery, which he paid for by running combine for area farmers.
Tim had a close circle of friends from FFA and he and his brothers had inherited their father's passion for tractor pulls, working together on a more powerful souped-up version. His tractor was named "The Lonesome Loser."
He was the oldest of eight brothers and sisters.
Kelly, who had wanted to be a beautician since she was a little girl, had just finished beauty school and was working at the Robin's Nest II hair salon.
Her mother, Norma Walker, described her as a "very outgoing, happy person with lots of friends and just starting on her career."
She had two brothers and a sister.
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