Overview

Last Seen: July 21, 1974
Location: Springfield neighborhood, Jacksonville, Duval County, Florida
Age: 9 years old

Jean left her grandmother’s home on West 19th Street to walk approximately two blocks to Hanna’s Food Store near 17th and Pearl Streets. She successfully reached the store and purchased cigarettes for her uncle. After initially forgetting the cigarettes, she returned to retrieve them.

Jean reportedly planned to use some of the change to play pinball at a nearby arcade known as The Hangout. Later accounts describe witnesses seeing an unknown man on a bicycle approach Jean and ultimately leave the area with her. Jean was never seen by her family again, and no confirmed remains have been recovered.

Detailed Case Breakdown

Jean Marie Schoen Missing from Jacksonville, Florida Since 1974

Nine-year-old Jean Marie Schoen, known as “Jeanie,” disappeared from Jacksonville, Florida, on July 21, 1974. More than five decades later, she remains missing, and her case is still listed as open with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.

Brief Case Summary

Last Seen: July 21, 1974
Location: Springfield neighborhood, Jacksonville, Duval County, Florida
Age: 9 years old

Jean left her grandmother’s home on West 19th Street to walk approximately two blocks to Hanna’s Food Store near 17th and Pearl Streets. She successfully reached the store and purchased cigarettes for her uncle. After initially forgetting the cigarettes, she returned to retrieve them.

Jean reportedly planned to use some of the change to play pinball at a nearby arcade known as The Hangout. Later accounts describe witnesses seeing an unknown man on a bicycle approach Jean and ultimately leave the area with her. Jean was never seen by her family again, and no confirmed remains have been recovered.

The Disappearance of Jean Marie Schoen

Jean Marie Schoen was born January 15, 1965. At the time she disappeared, she was nine years old, approximately 4 feet 2 inches tall and 55 pounds. She had blonde hair and green eyes and was missing an upper front tooth. She was reportedly wearing a dark blue shirt with red trim, blue shorts, and blue shoes.

Jean was a student at Love Grove Elementary School and participated in the Brownies. Accounts describing her childhood say she earned good grades and was energetic and outgoing.

An Errand to Hanna’s Food Store

On Sunday, July 21, 1974, Jean was staying at her grandmother’s home on West 19th Street in Jacksonville’s Springfield neighborhood.

She was sent to Hanna’s Food Store, located around 17th Street and Pearl Street, to purchase cigarettes for her uncle. The store was reportedly only about two blocks away.

Investigative accounts state that Jean arrived safely and made the purchase. She initially left without the cigarettes, realized they had been forgotten, and returned to the store to retrieve them.

Afterward, Jean reportedly said she was going to The Hangout, a nearby arcade, to use some of the remaining money to play pinball.

She never returned home.

The Reported Man on a Bicycle

Later summaries of Jean’s case describe a disturbing encounter after she went toward The Hangout.

According to those accounts, the arcade was not open for business when Jean arrived. Witnesses reportedly described an unknown white man riding a bicycle, with light-colored hair styled in a way that reminded them of Elvis Presley.

Some later reports state that the man took Jean into a restroom or bathroom area. When Jean emerged, she was reportedly crying. The man then left with her on his bicycle.

This portion of the case deserves some caution. A long-running Websleuths discussion examining historical coverage noted that the bicycle-abduction account appeared prominently in later reporting but was apparently absent from newspaper articles the contributors had located from the 1970s. That does not establish that the account is false, but it means the precise origin and documentation of those witness statements are not clear from the publicly available material.

What is firmly established is that Jean disappeared after making the short trip from her grandmother’s home and has never been confirmed alive or located since July 21, 1974.

Five Jacksonville Girls Disappeared in 1974

Jean’s disappearance occurred at the beginning of an alarming series involving young girls in Jacksonville during the summer and fall of 1974.

On August 1, less than two weeks after Jean vanished, sisters Lillian Annette Anderson, 11, and Mylette Josephine Anderson, 6, disappeared from their Jacksonville home.

Twelve-year-old Virginia Suzanne Helm disappeared on September 27. Her body was subsequently found in a shallow grave, and investigators determined that she had been shot.

Twelve-year-old Rebecca Ann Greene disappeared on October 12. Her skeletal remains were recovered several years later near Little Fort George Island.

The cases have generated decades of speculation over whether one person could have been responsible for multiple disappearances. Public case summaries have not established a definitive connection, however, and older accounts state investigators believed the incidents occurred in sufficiently different parts of Jacksonville that they were not necessarily related.

Some more recent advocacy-oriented case summaries say investigators have considered whether connections between at least some of the cases could be possible. No publicly announced evidence has established a single offender as responsible for Jean’s disappearance and the other 1974 cases.

More Than 50 Years Without an Answer

Jean’s disappearance has remained unresolved through enormous changes in investigative technology.

Her case is now represented in several national and nonprofit missing-person databases. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children continues to publish an active missing-child poster for Jean, identifying her as missing from Jacksonville since July 21, 1974. The current poster gives an age progression equivalent of approximately 61 years old.

The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office case is also listed as open through Solve the Case. That listing identifies the agency case number as 1974-314377 and gives Jean’s NamUs number as 42927 and NCMEC number as 1327043.

Latest Publicly Available Case Information

There has been no publicly announced arrest, confirmed suspect identification, recovery of Jean’s remains, or publicly disclosed forensic breakthrough in Jean’s disappearance.

The case has nevertheless continued to receive database attention.

The Charley Project updated Jean’s case on August 20, 2025, adding her date of birth and continuing to classify her as an endangered missing person.

The Doe Network subsequently recorded another update to Jean’s case file, 3021DFFL, on June 22, 2026. The update log does not disclose a new suspect, arrest, identification, or resolution; it simply records that information in the case file was updated.

As of the latest publicly available records reviewed, Jean remains missing and the Jacksonville case remains open.

What Happened to Jean Marie Schoen?

More than half a century after Jean disappeared, the central questions remain unanswered: Who encountered her after she completed the errand for her family, and where was she taken?

The passing decades make firsthand witness testimony increasingly difficult to recover, but advances in DNA testing, unidentified-remains comparisons, digitized records, genealogy research, and renewed examination of historical evidence have solved other cases once considered almost impossible.

Jean was nine years old when she disappeared. She would be 61 years old in 2026.

Anyone who has information about Jean Marie Schoen’s disappearance—even information previously believed to be insignificant—is encouraged to contact the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office or the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.