Ottawa’s Lonny Cain appearing on Joliet Historical Museum’s panel on Molly Zelko

Former Times Managing Editor Lonny Cain will take part in the Joliet Area Historical Museum’s inaugural virtual museum program, where he will discuss the Sept. 26, 1957, disappearance of Spectator reporter and editor Molly Zelko.

The program will be via Zoom at 6 p.m. Thursday.

Cain worked with late Joliet Herald reporter, columnist and city editor John Whiteside to reopen the investigation in 1978, taking a notorious cold-case disappearance and bringing new evidence to light in the form of witnesses.

“We came out with this series of stories in 1978, and we had a witness who said she saw a woman’s body being thrown into that ditch,” Cain said.

Zelko was the subject of a podcast Cain appeared on called The Spectator Podcast, named after the newspaper she wrote for. The podcast, which was organized by Joliet Area Historical Museum Executive Director Greg Peerbolte, referred to Zelko as a crusader against the gambling rackets run by local gang members who were aligned with corrupt politicians and local businessmen.

Her disappearance shook Joliet and drew attention nationally, including that of the first FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and Robert F. Kennedy.

The ditch in question is located on Stryker Avenue in Joliet, where a construction crew was working on installing a sewer line.

“A gentleman wrote John a letter, and we interviewed him,” Cain said. “He told the story of being called off work early, and it was his job to make sure the level of the ditch was right, put in line and covered up at the end of the day.”

Cain said the man worried after he was pulled off the job without covering it up. He was upset that he might lose money for not finishing the job because it was rolled into part of what he would be paid for.

“He was told to shut up and move on,” Cain said. “He understood what that meant.”

This was a man who had kept what he had seen to himself for years, Cain said. The only people he told were his family after he retired.

The story led Cain and Whiteside down rabbit hole after rabbit hole; Cain said he still feels like every time he turns over a rock, he finds another rock to turn over.

“A couple of years back, about two years, I decided I wanted to talk to the family of our original witness,” Cain said.

One of their early stories in the series involved a witness who lived in a house near the site where Cain believes Zelko was buried.

“The daughter was the oldest child, and the son hadn’t been born yet but he’d heard stories,” Cain said. “What I wanted to do was get inside her head from the kids’ perspective. I asked them if they believed their mother saw something that night on Stryker Avenue. The daughter said, ‘Oh yes, I believe her. I believe it because I saw it. I was in the room with her.’ ”

Cain said his end goal is to get the case open for investigation, which he believes would need to be as a crime scene. Some of the only remaining physical evidence is Molly’s shoes, which Cain said were stored in a brown paper bag at former Will County Sheriff Joseph Trizna’s home because Trizna viewed his precinct as a “leaky rowboat.”

Cain isn’t too optimistic that will happen. He already has brought the case in front of a cold case panel.

“Finding the body wouldn’t determine who killed her,” Cain said, in reference to a meeting he had with a state’s attorney who was interested in the story. “He told me there’s no prosecution, and it’s expensive.”

Cain said there would have to be a public outcry to get an investigation, and it would be politically embarrassing if they dug up the site and there was nothing there.

Cain said there’s more to the story that will come out once he finishes his book, some of which will be discussed in the panel discussion.

He also maintains a Facebook page named “The Search for Molly Zelko.” The Spectator Podcast is available on Apple iTunes, Spotify and thespectatorpodcast.com. Those who wish to register for Thursday’s Zoom panel can do so at https://zoom.us/webinar/register/1616105753479/WN_N6v5tHKiQIWgd6EpX9O24w.