Daughter shares details about her father who disappeared almost 70 years ago on hunting trip
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CARIBOU COUNTY — It’s been almost 70 years since a 25-year-old man went missing while on an elk hunt near Soda Springs, and his family still doesn’t know exactly what happened.
The story of Charles Miller was shared in October 2023 as part of the EastIdahoNews.com weekly Looking Back feature, which looks back on what life was like during certain time periods in east Idaho history.
Who was Charles Miller?
Miller was born and raised in St. Anthony, his daughter Jackie Rae Maupin, of Rexburg, told EastIdahoNews.com. Miller married Donna Rae (Jones) Miller on Oct. 22, 1948. Maupin said her family lived in Clearfield, Utah, where her father worked at the naval base driving a hyster.
Her parents were married for almost six years before Miller went missing.
Miller disappears on hunting trip
The Caribou County Sun reported on Oct. 14, 1954, that Miller was last seen around 5 p.m. on Oct. 10, 1954, by Odell Stoor, of Wayan, Idaho. Stoor and his party were camped near the spot where Miller and his hunting companion, Mark Campbell, of Arimo, were camped.
Stoor met Miller at the head of Brush Creek and mentioned they better head for camp before dark, according to the article. Stoor headed towards camp and Miller “unaccountably went in the opposite direction.”
Maupin said Campbell is her uncle — they call him “Uncle Buddy” — and that her dad and uncle often went hunting together.
“On that particular hunting trip they decided to split up,” she explained. “Dad went one way and Uncle Buddy went in the opposite direction. They wanted to cover more ground. They were to meet back at a certain spot by their camp site in the Tincup Campground. Of course dad never made it back to that spot.”
Maupin was four years old when her dad went missing. Her oldest brother was six and her other brother was almost three years old. Her mother was also six months pregnant with another son.
The search for Miller
Sheriff Ralph Marriott found out about the lost hunter around 3:30 a.m. on October 12, and he immediately organized a search, the Caribou County Sun reported. However, due to early season snow, the “37-man posse” led by the sheriff was forced to pause their search.
“A large-scale search for Miller was delayed because the sheriff’s office was not notified until early yesterday,” Marriott told the Idaho State Journal on Oct. 13, 1954.
Miller was a diabetic and needed insulin but didn’t have any with him on the hunting trip. Marriott said the only food Miller had with him was a few cookies.
The Journal reported on Oct. 20, 1954, that Marriott said he doubted Miller was still alive. He called off the large-scale organized search on Oct. 19, 1954.
“If he’s in there and there’s no reason to think he isn’t, I don’t see how he could survive with this weather, Marriott stated.
Marriott explained that searchers were discouraged after “hunting more than a week in vain” but he planned on making “spot checks” from time to time when volunteers are available.
Although the large-scale organized search was called off, a “determined band of relatives and friends” continued to look in the “rugged country in hopes of finding him.”
Maupin said search efforts continued on and off for around seven years.
“They even blew up the beaver damns to make sure he did not slip and fall in the stream and get caught in one and could not get out,” Maupin mentioned. “They finally had to call off the search and declared him deceased.”
Maupin said her dad’s death was most likely due to a combination of having no insulin and being caught in a snowstorm that moved in.
Life after Miller went missing
Maupin said her family stayed in Utah for a few years before moving to Arimo, Idaho, for a couple years. They eventually went back to Utah and lived in Maupin’s grandparent’s basement apartment, while her mother put herself through school to become a beautician.
Although Maupin said she doesn’t remember a lot about her father because she was so young when he went missing, she knows he loved the outdoors, hunting, fishing and was “considered to be intelligent and a hard worker.”
“I do remember the last time I saw him,” Maupin stated. “He and Uncle Buddy were loading up Buddy’s pickup truck to go hunting. I was on the front lawn of Buddy’s home watching them.”
She added, “It’s strange but because I was so little, (his disappearance) was just a mystery I grew up with and accepted that we probably would not know the whole story in this life anyway.”
Maupin said her mother remarried and is now 92 years old and lives in Clinton, Utah.
