On September 17, 1934, a 21-year-old newlywed named Olga Mauger (nee Schultz) vanished without a trace from a remote stretch of wilderness near Togwotee Pass in northwestern Wyoming. She was six days into an elk-hunting honeymoon with her husband, Carl Mauger, when she disappeared during what was described as a brief rest stop while her husband scouted for game. Despite one of the largest search efforts in Wyoming state history at the time, Olga was never found. No body, no clothing, no trace was ever recovered.

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Olga Schultz was born on March 11, 1913, in Lead, Lawrence County, South Dakota. Her parents were of German ancestry and had emigrated from eastern Russia, arriving in Baltimore, Maryland in 1905. They eventually made their way further and further west, eventually settling in Wyoming. There, Olga grew up in the rugged outdoors and became by all accounts a skilled and experienced outdoorswoman. She had hunted and trapped in the Togwotee Pass region through much of her childhood and was intimately familiar with the terrain.

Carl Mauger was an oilman working in Midwest, Wyoming, a booming oil town in the 1930s. For approximately five or six years, Carl had been in a relationship with a woman named Ella Tkach (aka Tchack). Ella was seemingly interested in marrying Carl, but he kept putting the wedding off, allegedly because he wanted to be more financially secure first.

The trajectory of Carl’s life changed at a dance in Midwest, Wyoming in the summer of 1934. While there with Ella, Carl encountered Olga Schultz. The attraction was immediate, and Carl and Olga fell headlong into their romance. The new couple was married on September 11, 1934, in Harrison, Nebraska, only weeks after the couple first met.

The speed of the marriage naturally raised concerns in Olga’s family almost immediately. According to her sister, Edith Thompson, Olga seemed deeply unhappy even while packing for the honeymoon. Edith later recalled that Olga begged her to come along on the trip, an unusual request. There is some confusion as to a letter that was sent during this time in which the writer allegedly claimed they wanted to commit suicide. Some allege Olga wrote to her sister, but giving no immediate reasons as to the source of her depression. Others say Ella wrote the letter to Olga and Carl after being jilted. Still other accounts say that Olga wrote it to Ella due to guilt over the whole situation.

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In any event, Carl and Olga began their homeymoon without further ado. On the sixth day, they set out on a hiking and hunting expedition above Angle’s Camp on Togwotee Pass; it was a remote area approximately 40 miles west of Dubois, Wyoming. The camp was operated by Al and Bertha Angle on a site today known as the Togwotee Mountain Lodge.

According to Carl’s account (which remained consistent throughout repeated questioning) the couple hiked for miles into the wilderness toward the Continental Divide, following game trails in search of elk. The temperature was near freezing but Olga was dressed for the weather in tan breeches, a blue shirt, a gray pullover sweater, and high-laced boots. She carried a small hatchet in her belt and a bag of sandwiches.

After a long hike, Carl suggested they climb a small hill to scout for elk from a different vantage point, but Olga said she was tired and opted to rest on a rock. When he left to check out the view, she was within hearing distance of passing cars on the Togwotee Pass Road, which had been built in 1921.

Carl estimated he was gone no more than 20 to 30 minutes. When he returned to the spot where he had left Olga, she was gone. Some accounts state that the empty bag of sandwiches was all that remained; others say there was nothing there at all, not even footprints. Carl called out her name and searched the immediate area before returning to camp to report her missing.

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Word of Olga’s disappearance reached Ranger KC “Sunny” Allan through a report from Mrs. Angle of Angle’s Camp. Allan organized what became the largest search effort in Wyoming’s history at that time. Within a matter of days, more than 300 people were involved, including dozens of members of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) working at nearby Jackson Lake; game wardens; Teton County Sheriff J.A. Francis; private citizens; and approximately 20 Washakie Indians who served as expert trackers and were accompanied by bloodhounds.

The search covered the rugged terrain extensively but turned up nothing. An early-season snowstorm moved into the region within days of Olga’s disappearance, hampering and eventually curtailing search efforts. The County Attorney Wilford W. Neilson told the Helena, Montana newspaper that there was little hope of finding the woman given the weather conditions.

Searchers initially believed they had found tracks belonging to Olga approximately eight miles from where she was last seen. However, the Washakie Indian trackers who were brought in specifically for their expertise disputed this finding. The trackers explained that the footprints were not Olga’s, and further pointed out that the terrain, while rugged, was open enough that Carl would have been able to see Olga’s resting place for the entire duration of his scouting climb, right up until the moment he described turning around.

Cries for help were reportedly heard from a canyon on the Wednesday night following her Monday disappearance, though no one was located when they looked around the area.The formal search was suspended by August 1935, largely due to the fact that many of the original searchers had to step aside to harvest their hay and fight some forest fires that popped up. That said, officials stated they had not abandoned hope of finding her still.

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For months, Carl was detained and questioned repeatedly by authorities about the incident. For a time, they suspected he may be the same “Carl J. Mager” who was wanted in Denver on a charge of larceny. Fortunately, it was later shown that the wanted man had a birthmark that Carl did not have.

An October 9, 1934 article in the Casper Star-Tribune reported that Carl had been held in jail but he was eventually released into the custody of his brother-in-law, Fred Schultz. Despite the suspicion leveled at him, Carl’s account of events never wavered through prolonged questioning and the police ultimately concluded there was no evidence that Carl had played any role in his wife’s disappearance.

Carl himself continued to search for Olga after his release and returned to the search area the following year with two of Olga’s brothers. Finally, in May 1941, Carl filed for divorce from his still-missing wife. After obtaining the divorce, Carl finally married Ella, and the couple reportedly moved to California. They remained there the rest of their lives.

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Theory 1: The most straightforward explanation is that Olga suffered a fatal accident in the mountainous terrain. Togwotee Pass is remote and riddled with crevasses. If she fell and died in an inaccessible location, it would explain why no body, clothing, or belongings were ever recovered despite years of searches by hundreds of people. Olga’s skill in the outdoors makes this scenario seem less likely to those who knew her, but accidents can happen to even experienced outdoorspeople.

Theory 2: Olga’s sister Edith Thompson strongly believed it was possible Olga deliberately vanished. Edith believed Olga had quickly regretted her hasty marriage to Carl and, finding herself briefly alone near a public road with $30 in cash and marketable stenography skills, seized the opportunity to start a new life elsewhere. The proximity to the Togwotee Pass Road,where passing cars could provide a ride to virtually any direction, made this scenario certainly plausible.

Simply walking away may have seemed a more viable escape than a formal legal dissolution of the marriage. However, detractors point to the fact that Olga never again contacted any family member or close friend in the years that followed, silence that her own sisters found inconsistent with her character.

Theory 3: Given the circumstances,  suspicion of foul play was never fully extinguished. The Washakie trackers’ clearly believed Carl was able to see Olga throughout his entire climb making it difficult for her to vanish without him noticing. Nonetheless, no physical evidence of violence was ever found, Carl’s story remained consistent under months of interrogation, and authorities ultimately concluded there was insufficient evidence to charge him.