Mary Brunette Chagnon, 54, disappeared after leaving her Duluth home in the 2800 block of East Superior Street on August 23, 1973. She was driving the family car to the Twin Cities for a Founder’s Day Workshop meeting and to visit friends but never arrived. A few days later her car was found abandoned in a downtown Minneapolis parking lot, reportedly wiped clean of fingerprints.

Mary was a visible community figure — an activist on women’s issues, an opponent of the Vietnam War, the 8th District coordinator for the Minnesota Women’s Political Caucus and a freelance commercial artist who illustrated a children’s book in 1971. At the time of her disappearance she lived with her husband, Raymond, and their two sons. Raymond later moved to California; in 1977 he was arrested for shooting a female friend and pleaded guilty to assault with intent to commit murder. After Mary was declared legally dead in 1980, two cigar boxes rigged to explode and, underneath the porch, about 100 pounds of deteriorated dynamite and blasting equipment were found in the Duluth house.

No charges have been filed in Mary Chagnon’s disappearance and she remains listed as a missing person. Can anyone with information about Mary’s last known movements or the car found in Minneapolis come forward?