Over Labor Day weekend in 1985, a woman named Deborah went on a whitewater rafting trip with her husband and some people from an Elkhart-based kayaking club.
At that point, Ada's disappearance was still big news, so it was only natural that the group started to talk about it when they stopped at a campsite to rest and cook dinner.
And as they sat around the campfire chatting, one guy's commentary really stood out.45-year-old Terry, who was there with his wife.This guy appeared to know a lot about the situation.
He told them he knew the Herodines well, he was the godfather of their youngest son Jeff, and he said he didn't believe Ada would willingly leave the boy behind.But he said that if anyone had the right to leave, it was Ada.
Sure, on the surface, her family had it all, like a nice home in a good neighborhood and a lake house.But the truth was, he said, her and Ed's marriage was far from perfect.Ed was rarely around, always either working late or out drinking.
And Terry thought Ada would be tempted to have an affair.Actually, Terry claimed she had already had an affair. because he said that Ed wasn't Jeff's biological father.Her mysterious paramour was.
And although Terry didn't name names, Debra got the impression that he knew who the guy was.Now, according to Terry, this wasn't a secret to Ed.In fact, he said Ed was the one who told him about it. But it was news to everyone else.
Of all the stories and theories floating around about Ada, no one had heard this one before.And these rumors were about to send the investigation in a whole new direction.This is Episode 6, The Rumor.
The woman who initially heard this story, Deborah, her dad, Phil Stiver, was a retired police officer, a former higher-up at Elkhart PD, actually, and she knew that he was interested in this case.
She brought that up to Terry, and Terry was like, well, have him give me a call.I'll fill him in, which is exactly what Phil did.During their first call, Terry told Phil that he had been friends with the Harrodines since the early 70s.
He met Ed when the company Terry worked for leased a truck to a manufacturing plant that Ed ran at the time.And he said over the years, he and Ada became especially close.Here's a voice actor reading part of the statement that Phil gave to police.
He then went on to tell me that with Ed being an alcoholic and working late, he would spend a great deal of time with her alone at the house and probably knew her better than anyone.
He told me that while the situation never became intimate between them, he felt it could have.He did say that Ed knows the boy is not his.
He went on to say he did not know who the father is, that there had been some hanky-panky in the past and she had contemplated an abortion as an alternative to having the boy.
Terry also said that he ran into Ada a lot at the Y, and he gave Phil a heads-up.If anyone reported that Ada was talking to a handsome guy in the lobby, about 6'2", 210 pounds, with brown hair, well, that would be him.
He thought that she seemed to be in high spirits lately, radiant, super confident, even flippant, as if everything was going her way.
And despite what Terry told Debra about his belief that Ada wouldn't leave Jeff, now he theorized to Phil that she was the perfect candidate to run away based on how little attention Ed paid her.
So after they spoke, Phil passed the information along to Elkhart detective Art Kern, who wanted to get Terry on record.Phil was the one who reached out to Terry again to facilitate a meeting.
But during their second conversation, things took a little turn.Once Terry realized that the police were officially entering the chat, he started to back off those paternity claims a bit. Like he was still implying that Ed wasn't Jeff's father?
He just didn't sound as certain as he had been.
Although, as Terry told the FBI agent who stopped by for an interview with the local lawn care product company he owned late that September, she seemed to be awfully friendly with some of the younger guys who worked at the family's lodge.
And, before she had Jeff, she was quote-unquote ripe for attention.So if a man gave her some, he'd get a response. According to Terry, Ada had supposedly responded to him back in the mid-70s.
And although I don't know exactly what he meant by that, he went on to describe it as a need for friendship on her part, because she was lonely and unhappy with Ed.
He even told the agent that Ed was overheard saying that he wouldn't let Ada's affair ruin their marriage. But as he pointed out, it's not like Ed's hands were clean.
Terry said Ed had affairs of his own, including one with an ex-mistress of a former business partner.Terry even went to that woman's apartment once to help Ed move some furniture.Now, this part wasn't new.
Police already knew Ed had stepped out on his wife, and they later verified the specific fling that Terry mentioned.But no one else, and I literally mean no one else, had accused Ada of having an affair, or even a casual flirtation.
And no one else had told police that Jeff wasn't Ed's son.So Terry's accounts, somewhat inconsistent though they were, really caught detectives' attention.If any of it was true, it was a game-changer.
So why didn't he come forward when she first went missing?And why was he the only one who seemed to know about this stuff?
That FBI agent assigned to Ada's case, who was transferred out of the area soon after, might have just thought Terry was a guy looking for attention, because he apparently wrote Terry off after their interview.
Maybe that's why Elkhart investigators didn't bother to check in on him until February 1986, which is nearly five months later.
By then, when Detective R. Kern showed up for a planned meeting with Terry, he noted in his report that the dude was not happy to see him.And his story went from somewhat inconsistent to all over the frickin' map.
Here's another voice actor reading from the report of that meeting with Terry.
We found Terry quite belligerent towards us and abusive, almost to the point of combativeness.In talking with him, he states that he is tired of us messing him around.
He states that he felt this was more the case of a rookie trying to make a name for himself than it was an investigation.
At this time, we advised the subject that we had to talk with everyone involved in the case and his name had been mentioned and we were not satisfied with the information gained.The subject continued to show quite a bit of anger.
He did invite us into his office and there told us that he would answer questions only with a yes or a no.
After talking with him for a few minutes and getting his date of birth and name and so forth, the subject did calm down and agree to talk with us in polite tones of conversation.
He states that information that he had about the child being of another parent other than Ed was probably supposition on his part.
He said that at no time did Ed ever say anything directly to him that would lead him to believe that Ed was not the natural father of the child.
Terry actually denied having anything to do with starting the rumor about Jeff's paternity.He also told them he didn't think Ada would confide in him, and even though they were close friends, their relationship had tapered off over the years.
He said he last saw the Herodines at the YMCA in the spring of 1985, and that's when Ada struck him as being radiant and happy.He said he hadn't seen her like that since she was pregnant with Jeff.
But he also noted that she had acted uncharacteristically insensitive, making a snide comment to Terry about him being deaf, even though he actually was hard of hearing.
I asked him if Ed was not the father of the child, who he would suspect, and he said there was a possibility that Ada might have been friendly with the subject who stayed at the cottages.
Owned by her husband's family, unknown who this subject would be.With the information gained from the subject, we will do a background check on him and then proceed further.
It would appear that at this time the subject was angry, unknown reason, and it would appear further that if he does have a violent temper, it is possible that something could have happened to cause a reaction between him and Ada.
When I asked him where he was on May 8th, he was unable to give us information, stating he did not know, but assumed that he was at his place of business.
The subject appeared upset that we got his name either from the FBI or from whomever he had talked to originally.
Terry's shifting accounts and his anger toward the detectives hadn't done him any favors, not to mention his lack of an alibi.And so they set out to learn everything they could about Terry.
They found out he started his business about a decade prior after buying it from someone. He didn't have a criminal record, just a few traffic violations.
They saw he had reported some incidents himself, like thefts from his shop and a dispute with a customer that actually turned physical not long after Ada's disappearance.
That customer had allegedly grabbed him by the throat and kneed him in the groin. And then as far as his personal life goes, Terry had remarried at some point after he and his first wife, with whom he had an adult son, split in 1980.
He and his new wife and their toddler son lived in a mobile home behind his shop while they built a house on a few acres of land that they had recently bought.
And it was the mention of his ex-wife, let's call her Megan, that made detectives' ears perk up.They figured, if anyone could spill the tea on Terry, it would be her.
Megan's account of her and Terry's friendship with the Harrodines mirrored Terry's to some extent.She said after Terry and Ed met through business dealings, the couple started having dinner and playing cards together.
Their son was just a few months younger than Ed and Ada's older boy, Greg, and Greg remembers the families getting together.
He and I were the same age, so when they hung out together, we'd play together.
The couples spent time together at the Harrodines Lake House, and Terry and Megan even visited them hundreds of miles away, one of the times that they relocated for Ed's job.
A memorable New Year's Eve found them all in Wisconsin for days of snowmobiling and socializing.
And because they shared religious beliefs, Ada asked Terry and Megan to be Jeff's godparents when he was baptized in 1976, just a few months after he was born. But things weren't so rosy in Meghan and Terry's marriage.
She told police that by the time she filed for divorce, Terry was gone almost every night.And even when he was home, they slept in separate bedrooms.She said he'd insult her, calling her fat or saying she wasn't good enough for him.
She described him as sexually self-centered, demanding, controlling, manipulative, even violent.When he was angry, he would break things in the house, and he liked to push people around to show his strength.
She said that one time, he beat their son with fists and a large board.And another time, he pulled handfuls of hair out of the boy's head.
She told them that Terry and their son still weren't very close, although they had been spending some time together clearing brush and timber from Terry's new property since last May or maybe June.
Even after their divorce, Terry's behavior scared her.When he suspected that Megan had a boyfriend, he threatened to kill the guy if he caught them together, even though he admitted to having multiple affairs during their marriage.
And once, after a nasty confrontation over finances, Megan said she told a friend that if she ever went missing, they should have police focus the investigation on Terry.
But despite concerns for her own safety, it didn't seem like she ever considered that Terry might be responsible for Ada's disappearance.
She remembered hearing the news and his nonchalant reaction when she called to let him know, but that really wasn't out of the ordinary for him.As revealing as an ex's account can be, there's always the chance that they have an ax to grind.
So detectives hope to talk to other people who were close to Terry to get a fuller picture of who he was. But the problem was, Megan told detectives that Terry was somewhat of a loner who spent most of his time at his shop or working out at the YMCA.
She couldn't point them toward his close friends.She didn't think he had any.She also didn't know of any old girlfriends for them to talk to, either.
But she said there was this former employee, this woman named Rena, who kept Terry's books in the early 80s, and she might have more information. When detectives sat down with Rina, she told them that she thought Terry was dishonest.
She said he had asked her to alter information in his financial records and that he sometimes pocketed money from sales without recording the transactions, a practice that could have serious consequences even though he owned the company.
She claimed that he made big promises about raises and profit sharing that he never made good on. He also seemed to have anger issues and liked to get even with people that he felt wronged him.
Those were a lot of the reasons that she quit working for him.Rina said that she did remember the Herodines.She said they were good friends with Terry.Ed and Terry went kayaking and camping together.
And Terry had even fondly described Ada as someone who was a lot of fun. She remembers times that Ed had called the shop for Terry, and times that Ada even came in alone.
Like at some point in 1983, Ada had stopped by to discuss issues she was having with the lawnmower they bought. Then Rina gave them this little tidbit about how Terry met his current wife.
She was one of several who responded to a personal ad that he placed in which he described himself as a tall, successful businessman looking for an intelligent woman.
And interestingly enough, Rina thought that their wedding took place on May 8, 1983, exactly two years to the day before Ada went missing. a detail that obviously leapt out to detectives.
But when they looked into it, there was no record of the marriage with the Elkhart clerk.It appears they married out of state, and it doesn't seem like police ever learned Terry's new anniversary.And we couldn't find it either.
Now, it wasn't just people close to Terry who had these less than flattering things to say about him.
When detectives reached out to the manager of a local credit bureau, just kind of looking for some intel on his finances, as soon as the manager heard Terry's name, she was like, oh yeah, I know that guy.
She told them that she had dealt with him on a collection matter and that he had reacted, quote unquote, very violently about the whole situation.She described him as short-fused.
Now even though his ex said that he didn't have many friends, by her own admission, Ed had been one of Terry's friends.Surely he could give them some insight on this guy and his relationship with Ada.But that's not what happened.
Because in conversations with his brother-in-law Larry and detectives, Ed totally downplayed his and Terry's relationship. He basically just described Terry as the guy who had sold the Herodines their lawnmower.
When it needed repairs, Terry would transport it back and forth to his shop so Ada didn't have to haul it around.In fact, Ed thought he might have done that just a week or two before she went missing, but he wasn't positive.
And he did remember that he and Ada ran into Terry at the YMCA in April of 85, and that Terry had stopped by their house one night that spring, although he didn't know the date.But Ed insisted they weren't close, never really had been.
He said they used to be friendly with Terry and his ex-wife back in the early 70s when they all lived in Goshen, which is a town just about 20 minutes away from Elkhart.
But he said that was really just because the Haridynes didn't know anyone else there.And even then, he said they were really more of Ada's church friends than anything.Ed thought Terry was obnoxious, so he tried to keep his distance.
And he said he never got the impression that Ada was attracted to Terry.
He's a very overbearing guy.I remember him making my dad uncomfortable at times."
It was clear Ed didn't see Terry as being as tight with their family as Terry himself seemed to think he was.
In fact, Ed initially didn't even recall that Terry and his ex-wife were Jeff's godparents, and he didn't remember them visiting when he and Ada moved away for his job. But it's not like Terry was just blowing smoke.
After all, he was right about at least one of Ed's affairs.And a baptism certificate that we found among Larry's documents confirmed that Terry and his ex-wife were indeed Jeff's godparents.
Although, Jeff told Nina he's not surprised that his dad forgot that detail.
— My mother was connected to the church, my father maybe not so much.
But if Terry wasn't a presence in the Harrodines' life before Ada went missing, it seems like he was after.
And then I do remember Terry coming over when I got home from college that spring.He came over a handful of times.He was stopping by here and there.
Police grew even more suspicious when they discovered that Terry used to own a white work van that matched the description of a vehicle seen near Ada's house around the time she went missing.A van that he no longer had.
That's next in Episode 7, Means, Motive, and Opportunity.You can listen to that next week.
Sign in
