Disappearance of Clarence Van Landschoot of Rochester, NY in 1915

Clarence Van Landschoot was born in 1894 in Rochester, NY as son of Peter and Sophie Maslyn. Father Peter age 28 died in 1898 in Rochester, his widow remarried to Jacob Vershay in 1899. Sometimes Clarence was listed as Landschoot other times as Vershay. The fact is, his father was a Van Landschoot. Peter's younger brother Paul returned to Holland in 1897, he was in Rochester since 1892.

On april 28th 1915 we found the following story of Clarence in a newspaper told by his mother Sophie Maslyn:

He was a good boy and I feel that if he was alive he would communicate with me", is a statement made by Mrs. Christine Vershay in her petition to have her son, Clarence Landschoot, declared legally dead and letters of administration on his estate granted to her, filed in Surrogate's Court yesterday. Landschoot, not quite 21 ears old, left Rochester suddenly on June 28th 1915, without telling anyone he was going, the petition sitea. Two days later, he sent his mother a post card from Detroit. That was the last heard from him.

Previous to that time, his mother states, he never had been away from home except to attend the Toronto Exposition, and on that occasion he wrote her every day. All efforts to find him have been unavailing. The police were requested to look for him, advertisements were inserted in several newspapers and Inquiries made among his old associates, but without result. There is no record to prove that he was in military service during the World war. Besides his mother, Landschoot has two sisters in this city, Mrs. Elizabeth Weimer and Mrs. Florence 0'Coyne. He was unmarried when he disappeared. (This article appeared in the Rochester Chronicle sept 20th,1922)

The Vershay family's annual reunion took on added meaning for its members recently when the eldest son, Clarence Landschoot of Booneville, N. Y., returned home after an absence of 26 years. Mr. Vershay left home at the age of 19 with the expressed intention of seeing the world and has been traveling almost constantly ever since. He was surprised to find a sister, Mrs. Felix O'Coin, who was little more than a child when he went away, is now a grandmother, and his mother, Mrs. Christine Vershay, resides with a son - in - law, Charles Weimer of Wheeldon Drive. Mrs. Weimer, the former Miss Elizabeth Vershay died several years ago. His family found Mr. Vershay little changed, but Mrs. O'Coin admitted an amusing surprise at her brother's youthful appearance. Mr. Vershay returned to his home after spending the July Fourth weekend in Greece.

 Source:The Greece press ; 26 july 1940