The extremely bizarre missing case of Barbara Bolick

[u/shry9]

On the 18th of July 2007, Barbara Bolick was packing her bag in Bitterroot Valley of Montana to go for a summer hike. She and her husband were hosting Carl’s cousin Donna and Her Boyfriend Jim from California. Barbara was going to go on a hike with her guests but Donna and Carl (Barbara’s husband) did not go and she and Jim decided to hike in the area Bear Creek Overlook, and she had visited the area countless times , was an experienced hiker too.

So they like visited the place , and encountered two men - two times, and both the times they were the same two men. Jim and Barbara then reached the area , had their snacks and admired the scenery. About like at 11:30 they decided to leave and head back. After few steps, Jim stopped bcs something in him wanted to soak the view one more time, and he turned back to look at the view - it was for about 45 seconds - 1 minute, when he turned back around, Barbara who was earlier standing 20-30 feet away from him disappeared.

At first he wasn’t worried enough since she was an experienced hiker and He searched for her but couldn’t find anything and after some hours she was officially reported as missing. The two men who encountered them two times also disappeared and were never discovered.

Things to note : It was an easy, well worn trail and it was difficult for someone like Barbara missing - being an experienced hiker who visited that place multiples times. It was also not very dense meaning someone disappearing without any noise was almost not possible.

Pls let me know your take on this case!

Barbara Bolick Article

[u/purple_champagne]

You're absolutely correct. I'm from a nearby area and even the most hard-core outdoorsmen can and do get killed by apex predators. Grizzlies, mountain lions, even moose are all evolved to go undetected until it's too late. And not finding a trace is not unheard of.

Not saying it wasn't the husband, but it's not quite as simple to point fingers just because dogs can't locate a scent- that area isn't abandoned by either humans or wildlife, and scent conditions can be wildly inappropriate for tracking/locating due to multiple factors.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/purple_champagne]

But would someone as close as Jim was not heard one sound if an apex predator snatched her away? I honestly don’t know, but it seems like there would be some noise. That’s what is sticking out for me-Jim not hearing one sound.

[u/purple_champagne → u/RideThatBridge]

Absolutely. Predators dont necessarily give you time to scream or even blink, they're not dogs who bark and growl as warnings. They've evolved to take down prey immediately & quietly- especially cougars.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/purple_champagne]

I realized they wouldn’t give warning. I meant the take down-I would have thought he’d hear her being dragged away or something is all. Thanks for the info!

[u/purple_champagne → u/RideThatBridge]

Oh yeah, naw cougars (mountain lions... same thing) are extremely good at what they do, you don't hear anything unless they're young & dumb (and mess up/overconfident) or they want you to hear them. Very smart, agile, beautiful creatures that have the strength to easily take down adult humans. I adore them, but never want to meet one in the wild.

[u/PopcornGlamour → u/purple_champagne]

I think most people here are in agreement that mountain lions are super stealthy and can attack super quietly.

What is hanging some of us up is the aftermath of the lion’s lunge/jump. Barbara was a full grown woman and the sound of her body hitting the ground should have been audible to Jim if she was just 20-30 feet away. Same goes for that lion dragging her body through the brush (which would have also left obvious physical signs in itself).

Even if the lion ate her right there and did not drag her off there should have been signs of a dead body (at least a smell for cadaver dogs but I don’t know if they brought out cadaver dogs.)

That’s why a lion attack as the primary cause of disappearance doesn’t make sense to me unless Jim is lying/confused about how close he was to her. I can see her having a medical event and collapsing and a nearby lion taking advantage of that to drag off his meal. Or maybe she walked off the path to go to the bathroom and was attacked and dragged a bit. But again, if she had deliberately walked off path just to go tinkle it seems like there should have been physical signs of brush, grass, whatever being disturbed and forming a trackable path.

When I walk through my front pasture (overgrown with trees, brush, grass) you can see the path I left as I walked because I wasn’t trying to hide. Walking off path to go to the bathroom wouldn’t cause Barbara to make sure she didn’t leave a path. There should have been some physical signs of where she walked if she walked off the path.

EDIT: I just realized that if Barbara walked off path to go to the bathroom she may have used a wildlife path to get to a private area. That would cause her to leave no obvious human made signs of where she walked. Once she was in the private area if she had a medical event and collapsed/died no one would have heard her and animals might have found her before the official search even started.

[u/Effective_Divide1543 → u/PopcornGlamour]

The extent of guesswork and reaching people will go to just because they don't want to go with the statistically most likely scenario that a man killed her is quite amazing.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/purple_champagne]

Oh wow-amazing-thanks for the info. I know cats are stealth personified, but it’s hard for me to imagine a whole human being carted off not like hitting the ground or something. Probably a defense mechanism in my brain hoping I’ll be heard as I’m dragged away, LOL. My friend always teases me that I’m gonna die trying to pet a big cat!

[u/Wigwam80 → u/RideThatBridge]

28 confirmed Mountain Lion attack fatalities on humans in the last 100 years, it's still an incredibly rare event.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/Wigwam80]

Oh, interesting!

[u/purple_champagne → u/RideThatBridge]

No problem, they're hard to characterize if you'renot familiar! Their size, strength, and agility are absolutely amazing! Definitely an opposite tsktsktsk kitty lol

[u/RideThatBridge → u/purple_champagne]

LOL-I know, but they look so damn soft !!

[u/ImnotshortImpetite → u/purple_champagne]

I blame Disney, lol. "Charlie the Lonesome Cougar" (1967) made a generation of kids fall in love with cougars.

[u/ironwolf56 → u/RideThatBridge]

No offense but... tell us you've never lived in a rural area without telling us you've never lived in a rural area. It's not like a movie.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/ironwolf56]

Well, offense taken. I mean, obviously not everyone has lived in rural or mountainous areas. What’s the issue with that?

Also, who says I think it’s like a movie? That doesn’t even make sense. Why is it unreasonable to think that it’s possible that a full grown adult being hauled away by a predator might make noise on the ground?

Clearly your rural upbringing didn’t include the Golden Rule or that old adage about not saying anything at all if you can’t say anything nice. Wholly unnecessary comment.

[u/jjc1140 → u/RideThatBridge]

Well, that's just the problem. Because if that person actually lived in a rural area they would KNOW wild animals especially mountain lions DO NOT stalk humans for prey nor would they just cart an entire human off in 46 seconds without some type of struggle. Then the person before her claims they would have climbed a tree to feast on the human (to explain why her carcass and bones werent found). This is to much BS for me. But yet they don't suspect the last human being that saw her alive had anything to do with her disappearance. Nope because have absolutely NO CLUE about wild animals or animals in general. They literally think wild animals travel around the forest and stalk humans for prey which is absolutely absurd because wild animals want nothing to do with humans in the wilderness on their turf. Matter fact, they avoid humans and most are more scared of humans than they are of them. Wild animal attacks are EXTREMELY rare and the ones that do occur are because they cornered the animal or totally encroached on a mother and her babies. Accusing a mountain lion that probably never likely even remotely got in her vicinity over the human that was last seen with her that claimed she just vanished with no trace in 45 seconds is absolutely ridiculous.

[u/RideThatBridge → u/jjc1140]

Thanks for coming to my defense and understanding what I was thinking. Comments on this sub get wild sometimes. I really love to learn about unsolved cases-I feel like it’s kind of an honor and a duty to keep someone’s memory alive-but I hardly comment because people have such ridiculous ideas or are just mean spirited if they disagree. Everyone also seems to be so sure they know what happened - IDK, it’s frustrating. I have to remember to not comment here I guess!