Paula Jean Welden: The College Student Who Walked into the Woods (E125)

On December 1, 1946, 18-year-old Paula Jean Welden left her dorm at Bennington College and went for a walk along Vermont’s Long Trail. She never returned.Multiple witnesses reported seeing Paula hiking alone that afternoon, bundled in a red coat, heading deeper into the woods. Then nothing. No confirmed sightings. No trace. No body.Her disappearance would become one of Vermont’s most haunting unsolved cases and played a direct role in the creation of the Vermont State Police.