After decades of anonymity, the DNA Doe Project has identified New Buffalo Jane Doe as 71-year-old Dorothy Glanton. Glanton left her home in Chicago, Illinois on Dec. 9, 1987 and never returned. When her remains were recovered the following April in Lake Michigan, authorities were unable to identify her despite exhaustive efforts.
The breakthrough in this case came when the Michigan State Police brought it to the DNA Doe Project. In the summer of 2023, once a DNA profile had been generated and uploaded to two genetic genealogy databases, a team of volunteer investigative genetic genealogists with the DNA Doe Project came together at a retreat to work on building a family tree for the unidentified woman.
They soon came to learn that the initial assessments from 1988 were inaccurate. Originally, authorities believed that New Buffalo Jane Doe was a Caucasian woman in her 40s or 50s, but she turned out to be African American and in her 70s at the time of her death. Unfortunately, these kinds of mistakes were relatively common in the era prior to DNA analysis and the widespread use of forensic anthropology.
As with many African American cases, genealogy records became difficult to locate when researchers reached back into the period of enslavement. But the team eventually homed in on the right family and came across Dorothy, who had been born and raised in Alabama before she and her family moved to Chicago in the 1920s as part of the Great Migration.
Furthermore, the mistaken age estimate complicated research efforts. “At first, we thought we were looking for a daughter of Dorothy, based on the expected age of the deceased,” said team leader Lisa Needler. “When we narrowed our search directly to Dorothy, we were surprised to learn she would have been in her 70s at the time she was missing.”
While searching for proof of life for Dorothy, researchers found a heartbreaking clue - a newspaper advertisement placed in August 1988 by a relative on behalf of Dorothy’s elderly mother. “It said, 'your mother is ill, lonely & afraid” and “she needs you desperately,'” said co-team leader Robin Espensen. “Unfortunately, Dorothy's body had already been found a few months beforehand.”
The DNA Doe Project is grateful to the groups and individuals who helped solve this case: the Michigan State Police, who entrusted the case to the DNA Doe Project; the Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine, who exhumed Dorothy’s remains and took samples to undergo the lab process; Astrea Forensics for extraction of DNA and sample prep for whole-genome sequencing; HudsonAlpha Discovery for sequencing; Kevin Lord for bioinformatics; GEDmatch Pro and FTDNA for providing their databases; our generous donors who joined our mission and contributed to this case; and the DNA Doe Project’s dedicated teams of volunteer investigative genetic genealogists who work tirelessly to bring all our Jane and John Does home.
Republished courtesy of DNA Doe Project