More than 700 people attended an auction on March 25, 1985 at Vagabonds Hall in Lyndora to help raise funds for the Cherrie Mahan Reward Fund. Tuesday marked the 38th year since Cherrie disappeared after getting off the bus at her Winfield Township home. Articles and pictures regarding the 8-year-old’s disappearance have appeared in the pages of the Butler Eagle almost every year since then.

The unnamed reporter who typed up what was likely a faxed news release from state police at Troop D in Butler on Feb. 23, 1985 likely figured the cute little dark-haired, doe-eyed girl peering impishly from a school picture on page 1 would already have been found by the time the Butler Eagle landed on thousands of stoops the following afternoon.

But 38 years later and in almost every year since then, the public is still asked by Troop D investigators to share any information they might have on the strange disappearance of Cherrie Mahan, then age 8.

Cherrie got off the school bus at the end of her long driveway on Cornplanter Road with four other children at about 4:15 p.m. on Feb. 22, 1985, and vanished.