Never To Be Forgotten!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                          Today is National Missing Children's Day.  The occasion was prompted by the disappearance, 46 years ago, of then six-year-old Etan Patz in SoHo.

                           It was a hurtful period for me, just seven weeks after my mother's death, from which I had barely recovered, and now this senseless tragedy, which remained unsolved for decades.

                            Walking to school for the first time, on the road to independence, Etan was lured to a store basement by bodega worker Pedro Hernandez, attacked, and killed, by strangulation.  According to Lisa R. Cohen's book "After Etan--The Missing Child Case That Held America Captive," Hernandez took the dead child's body to an apartment building basement, and placed it in the boiler, thereby cremating him.  Which why remains were never found.

                                Very clever and calculating.  Decades later, Hernandez was found guilty of this crime and is now serving time in jail, where he belongs.

                                  Etan Patz' name became code for every parent's nightmare.  It still is, and those of us who remember the event are forever haunted by that innocent face appearing on milk cartons and stores everywhere.

                                     Etan's case changed the way missing child cases were handled.

                                    It is a shame he had to lose his life for this to be achieved.

                                    Rest In Peace, Etan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Always remember!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!