The Disappearance of Donna

by M.P. Pellicer | Stranger Than Fiction Stories
You might think that anyone can go missing, in any place, for any reason but in a rural town that in 1968, had a population of less than 100, there it's hard to understand how a woman could vanish so completely.

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Donna Jeanne Michalenko (Source - North Dakota Lost & Missing)

It was a brisk, fall night in November, 1968 when Donna Jeanne Michalenko was seen at Earl's Bar, a solitary watering hole in the town of Kief, North Dakota. She left with her date around midnight, and no one has ever laid eyes on her again.

Kief was a farming community settled by immigrants from Ukraine, Russia and Germany at the turn of the century. It started off as a depot station for the Soo Line Railroad, and incorporated in 1908. It achieved a peak population of 307 in 1920.

Donna Jean Heydt married Bertholdt "Bert" Michalenko in 1946. Both of their families were from the area. They had three children, and divorced in 1964. The children lived with their father, however she still visited them there. Donna lived separately in her own place in Butte.

Bert remarried in 1974. He was a successful farmer and businessman in the Butte and Kief area. He was the former mayor of Butte and also served on the city council.

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Kief, ND c.1911

Prof. Eric Grawbosky, a private citizen took an interest in this case, and has researched extensively through interviews with family and open source materials more information about the circumstances surrounding Donna's disappearance. According to him, Donna was romantically involved with a man he refers to as B.L. There was a history of violence between them, including the last time they were seen at Earl's Bar which was on November 9, 1968.

It wasn't until December 27, six weeks after she disappeared that Donna was reported missing by her 21-year-old daughter. Since Donna was known to travel throughout the state to visit family or to sightsee, it took that long before the family realized that something was wrong.

When B.L. (still alive in 2017) who owned a farm nearby, was questioned about Donna's whereabouts, he said he dropped her off at her ex-husband's house in Butte, where her children lived.

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Abandoned Lutheran church, Kief, ND

According to those at the house, she never arrived. It seems strange he would not take her to where she lived. He was considered a suspect in Donna's disappearance, however as time passed the investigation stalled out.

Prof. Grawbosky did find out that Donna owned a dog named Trixie, that disappeared at the same time. The animal was later found shot to death inside a Lutheran church. He also mentions a tie in to Maury Terry's book The Ultimate Evil (1989) where it describes direct links to secret cults or satanists practicing in the area of Minot, North Dakota in those years.

​Strangely enough there is also a parallel to the sacrifice of dogs in several hidden locations where covens would meet in New York City, including the desecration of houses of worship. These individuals were known to travel between Minot, N.D. and boroughs in New York City.

In 1974, Arlis Perry, 19, was murdered inside Stanford Memorial Church two weeks before Halloween. Her body was posed and mutilated in what appeared to be some type of ritual murder. She had grown up in Bismarck, North Dakota, and had moved to California only 6 weeks before, after she married her high school sweetheart who was studying for his medical degree.

Arlis was interred on October 18 at Sunset Memorial Gardens in Bismarck. Most of those who attended the wedding were present for the funeral rites. Two weeks later on Halloween something strange happened. The temporary marker placed on her gravesite was stolen. No other marker in the cemetery was taken. The police found that a couple of "trophies" were taken from the murder scene. Could the marker have been another one?

Was there an unknown cult operating in the sparse landscape of North Dakota, that committed murders, but weren't pursued because their victims were not found, and like Donna were just deemed "missing persons"?

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Main St., Kief, ND c.1912

Donna Jeanne Heydt was born on September 15, 1929 to parents Martin Heydt  and Emma Engel who married on January 28, 1929. She had twin siblings born in January 1934. Lester died soon after birth, and Marilyn died a few months later. Her father Martin committed suicide in 1956 by shooting himself in the head.

There was nothing known in her background to provide a clue as to what happened to her.

A 2009 news article wrote of her as someone: "who decorated wedding cakes and whose children described as an artist, volunteered in her community and would do anything to help a neighbor in need."

Remains have never been recovered that have been linked to her, so there is no DNA material to match to any of her relatives. None of her belongings were ever taken, or any of her money used after she disappeared.

​Present day Kief is considered a ghost town with less than 10 inhabitants. All the businesses are shut down, and the people have moved away. In a place of wide open spaces, a body could be thrown in a field or buried, and remain unfound for years. Was this the fate of Donna Jean Michalenko? 

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Main Street, Dogden, ND

THE LOST BOY

Close to where Donna disappeared another strange story unfolded decades before. It involved a teenage boy who lived in Dogden. In 1890, a post office was named after nearby Dogden Butte. The town was founded in 1904 as Perley, and then changed to Dogden in 1906. The populace was so scarce that in 1904, the post office closed, but there were still farmers working the land.

On June 29, 1909, The Grand Forks Herald published a story about a lost boy. His name was Efeime (Efimenko) Potarenko, 14, who worked for Peter Michalenko (Bert's father). His family lived about nine miles south of Dogden. The teenager was sent into the pastures to get some horses. Almost two hours passed, and Michalenko sent out one of his young sons to find out what happened to him. The child returned saying he couldn't find him. Then Michalenko's son-in-law was sent out.

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Story of the Lost Boy, ND c.1909

He found young Potarenko laying still in the field, as if he was dead. He tried to revive him, but Potarenko did not respond. The son-in-law brought a horse team and took him back to the house. He was breathing, and stirred a bit. A message was sent to Kief to call Dr. Evan C. Stone at Balfour. The doctor upon examining the young man found he was unconscious and bleeding from his mouth, nose and ears. The doctor was not optimistic of his recovery, but the next day the bleeding had stopped and everyone continued to hope. Nothing else was ever published about what happened to Efeime Potarenko, allowing even for a misspelling of his first and last name.

​There is no explanation from Doctor Stone as to how a teenage boy ended up unconscious and bleeding. Was he attacked, or was there another cause? 

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