Some readers who have followed the tragic story of Kathleen Ann Shea of Tyrone at any time over the past six decades might have paused at one particular point while reading Mirror reporter Phil Ray’s article last weekend marking the 60-year “anniversary” of her kidnapping.

Here is a recap of the part of the article in question. Any parent with a child or children still in school needs to reflect on the important message that that part of Ray’s article delivered clearly, despite not actually stating the message.

The paragraphs containing the unwritten, though relevant, message:

“Police brought in bloodhounds, which tracked Kathy to North Avenue and Garfield Street (a distance of about 100 yards from her direct route to her school).

“Investigators believe at that point she entered a vehicle but they were never able to obtain a detailed description of a vehicle seen in the area that day (only that it was ‘worn’) and that there were reports of a man who had, a few months before, asked a patrol boy ‘to point out Kathy Shea.’

“A man of similar description was seen in the area the day before Kathy’s disappearance.”

The reason those paragraphs are significant — important to consider — is because of the necessary cautions they imply.

March 18, 1965, was a time when neither Tyrone, nor probably any other community in the six-county Southern Alleghenies region, had reason to be unduly worried about a child’s trek to or from school — as long as a child had been instructed about being careful when crossing streets. It was in fact a generally more innocent time from the standpoint of crimes like kidnapping and sexual molestation and other forms of abuse — although those crimes did exist in 1965.

Ray’s article of last weekend, when it indicated that bloodhounds had tracked Kathy to North Avenue-Garfield Street, confirmed basically that Kathy was lured to that site by someone who appeared to be friendly — or who was familiar — and not posing any danger.

Back then, many children were not cautioned about the crime of abduction or what to do if they were alone and approached by a stranger.

That changed on March 18, 1965, for Tyrone and communities near and far as news reports and updates about Kathy’s disappearance increasingly dominated radio and television newscasts and print media such as the Mirror.

Later, just shy of 14 months after Kathy disappeared, attention on May 11, 1966, shifted to Shade Gap, Huntingdon County, consumed for eight days over the kidnapping of Peggy Ann Bradnick, who was abducted as soon as she got off her school bus near her home.

The then-17-year-old spent those eight days with her kidnapper, William Hollenbaugh, also known as “Bicycle Pete,” in the mountains near her hometown evading police, until Hollenbaugh was shot and killed by police.

Bradnick survived the ordeal. Meanwhile, Cherrie Mahan, 8, apparently did not, following her abduction on Feb. 22, 1985, after getting off a school bus in front of her home in Winfield Township, Butler County.

Mahan has remained missing since that day, was declared legally dead by a Butler County Court judge in November 1998, and no arrest ever has been made in the case.

Three families’ heartaches, but only one of those cases ending on a happy note. At least three kidnappers, only one of whom paid a price for his crime.

The troubling question: Will there be more heartaches in the years to come?