Curtis S. Chandler

• Missing Since 08/28/1977
• Missing From Lockport, Illinois
• Classification Endangered Missing
• Sex Male
• Race White
• Age 14 years old
• Height and Weight 5'2, 134 pounds
• Clothing/Jewelry Description A dark blue short-sleeved t-shirt, blue jeans and red sneakers.
• Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian male. Brown hair, blue eyes. Curtis's nickname is Corky. He has a scar on the left side of his head, hidden by his hair, and an enlarged left ear as well as an appendectomy scar on his abdomen.

Details of Disappearance

Curtis was last seen in Lockport, Illinois on August 28, 1977. That evening he was with 47-year-old Owen Clark at the home of a neighbor, Clark's girlfriend Bobbie Jackson, in the 200 block of Dundee Road. They told Jackson they were going for a ride in her car, but she said they didn't actually take her car and left the neighbor's house on foot.

After 4:30 a.m. the next day, Clark walked into a fire station with burns over about 70% of his body and claimed he had been robbed and set alight by four youths, some of whom were white and some of whom were black.

He stated he was walking on Thornton Street when a car containing four young men had pulled up and they had offered him a ride, and when he refused they robbed him of $420, doused him in flammable fluid and set him on fire before driving off. Clark rolled in the grass to extinguish the flames, then walked a quarter of a mile to the fire station for assistance. He was alone.

Clark said he had last seen Curtis at 11:00 p.m. He said about half an hour earlier, he and Curtis had driven Jackson's car to purchase some items at a store near Thornton Street and Illinois Highway 7. They had argued. Clark said he decided to go for a walk to calm down, and told Curtis to take the car back to Jackson's house. Afterwards he was attacked. When the police went to Jackson's home to notify her, the car was in the driveway with the keys in it.

Authorities named Clark as a suspect in Curtis's disappearance, but he is deceased and was never charged in the boy's case. Curtis is a graduate of Taft Elementary School and was supposed to start classes at Lockport East High School in the fall of 1977. He has no history of runaway behavior. His disappearance remains unsolved.