Sean C. Morgan
One year ago Tuesday, Mark
Joseph Hardin’s wife, Angela
Hardin, reported him missing,
and she is hoping that someone
will be able to shed light on what
happened to him.
Linn County Sheriff’s Office
Search and Rescue looked for
Hardin, who was 49, in the Upper
Calappooia area for two weeks
before calling an end to the major
search effort on Aug. 21, 2011.
She told police that she saw
him last on Aug. 5, 2011 and
Sheriff Tim Mueller said he was
last seen by a pair of transients
camping about two miles from
Hardin’s vehicle on Aug. 7, 2011.
At one point, 83 searchers,
from Linn, Marion, Lane, Benton
and Deschutes county sheriff’s
offices, were looking for Hardin,
who enjoyed hiking in the Upper
Calapooia area.
Searchers located a water
bottle, cigarette butts and a lighter
in the
first two days but not much
else and logged more than 2,000
man hours of searching.
When Hardin was reported
missing, deputies located his
Chevrolet Lumina near the 100
line gate off Upper Calapooia
Road.
There has been “basically
nothing after they quit the search,”
Angela Hardin said. “I kept in
contact with the Sheriff’s Of
ice.
Unless there’s more leads, there’s
nothing they can do. It’s been a
year, and nothing is happening.”
This is the time of year when
people are out in the woods, and
she is hoping that someone will
find something and report it or
if anyone knows anything, he or
she will come forward with the
information.
“I’m looking for answers I’m
not going to get,” Hardin said, but
something might come up. “I go
up there all the time.”
She takes flowers up to the
area constantly, she said. It was a
place he really enjoyed hiking.
“I honestly don’t think he’s
alive,” Hardin said. “If he was
alive, I would feel differently. I
just want to know what happened
to him.”