A break in a decades-long cold case has finally come after an independent diver discovered remains in a car submerged in the Columbia River.

On December 7, 1958, the Martin family, including parents Kenneth and Barbara, and their three daughters, set off by car for a Christmas shopping trip, but they never came back. 

The next year, the bodies of the two youngest daughters, Virginia, who was 13, and Sue, aged 11, were discovered in the river. However, the oldest daughter, Barbara, aged 14, along with their parents, remained missing. 

The mystery gripped the nation for years, and crime junkies have spawned theories ever since as to what led to the Martin family’s tragic fate. 

Some believe they drowned after the car backed into the river accidentally. But there is also evidence that at least one of them was shot dead.  

An independent diver named Archer Mayo, deeply interested in the case, decided to dig deeper in an attempt to uncover the mystery surrounding the family’s disappearance. 

Last year, Mayo found the family’s station wagon in a deep section of the river that serves as the state line between Oregon and Washington, then reported the discovery to authorities. 

Local law enforcement launched a recovery effort for the car, but later suspended it after the vehicle’s frame detached and debris made it difficult to pull it out of the river. 

This summer, Mayo returned to the river to slowly suction debris from the car, he revealed to Oregon Live. 

Kenneth (right) and Barbara disappeared with their three daughters in 1958. The two youngest girls’ bodies were found the following year, but neither the car nor the eldest daughter nor the parents were ever found 

Last year, an independent diver located the potential car the family was driving when they disappeared in the Columbia River 

The recovery mission was unsuccessful, but independent diver Archer Mayo continued to search the site for evidence 

The car had split when authorities attempted to remove it from the river, creating a gap for Mayo to fish out evidence. 

He recovered human remains this month, including remains contained inside a nylon stocking. 

Mayo reported the findings to the Hood River County Sheriff’s Office, who have yet to confirm that the remains belonged to the Martin family. 

Authorities have said the case remains an open investigation. Daily Mail reached out to the sheriff’s department for an update. 

Authorities couldn’t lift the vehicle out of the river, but Mayo said he recovered human remains on his own and reported the findings to local law enforcement 

Mayo said he used predictive modeling to locate the vehicle and has dove into the ‘pit’ of the river ‘hundreds’ of times 

The update provides some hope for closure for the Martin family, but also for Mayo, who has spent the last seven years on the case. 

Mayo previously told Columbia Gorge News that he used predictive modeling to locate the vehicle in what’s known as the ‘pit’ of the river. 

He worked with historians and secured permits to launch a dive mission. Mayo located the vehicle last November and snatched the registration tags on the license plate.  

He told the outlet that he completed ‘hundreds’ of dives in the river, adding, ‘I can move around with zero visibility in this giant pit, because I’ve spent so much of my lifetime trying to solve this mystery’.

What happened to the Martins? 

The mystery of the Martin family captivated Americans for years, as the family of five seemed to vanish out of thin air on December 7, 1958. 

They were reported missing when the parents failed to show up for work two days later. Authorities believed their car had accidentally backed into the river at the time. 

It wasn’t until a month later that a gun was found near where they vanished. The sheriff’s office didn’t collect it as evidence, but decades later, the gun owner’s widow told local news that it had dried blood on it. 

In May 1959, the bodies of the two youngest daughters were recovered, and their deaths were ruled as a drowning. 

The eldest daughter, Barbara’s, body was never found, but her younger sisters, Virginia and Susan, were discovered floating in the river months after the family disappeared 

Donald Martin, the family’s eldest son, was in the service and living in New York when the Martins vanished 

Rumors swirled for decades about what happened to the Martins, but no suspects were ever named in the case (Pictured: The Martins’ family home in 1959)

However, an autopsy report cited a potential gunshot wound to the head. The Medical Examiner had disputed the wound as a result of decomposition. 

The family’s oldest son, Donald Martin, was 28 at the time and living in New York. He told detectives that he couldn’t see how his parents’ and sisters’ deaths were an accident. 

Multnomah County Deputy Sheriff Walter Graven was also skeptical about the family’s deaths at the time and spent years investigating the case. 

Despite the swirling theories about the family, the police never named any suspects or pursued a murder investigation.