Press Kit

What are the verified facts of the Hitz case?

• The caseAnna Maria Hitz, 17, heiress to the estate of Othmar John Hitz, reported missing from Washington, D.C. in November 1965.
• Front pageThe Washington Post, Tuesday, November 23, 1965: “D.C. Heiress to $10 Million Fortune Missing.” Original clipping in the archive.
• The turnThree days later she surfaced in Caracas, married and the mother of a baby daughter (Washington Daily News, Nov 26, 1965). Her mother doubted the cable was genuine (The Evening Star, same day).
• The fortune$10 million in 1965, counted at 30 to 50 million bolivars in the Venezuelan press and printed at up to 150 million francs in Swiss papers. In 1963 UPI reported it frozen in a Swiss bank. Per the family, never collected.
• The reporterPer the family records, the Washington Post reporters who pursued the story were both of the men who would break Watergate, years after the disappearance: Bernstein joined the Post in 1966, Woodward in 1971.
• The archiveAn archive of more than 500 documents (144 family originals, 1941 to 2019; about 200 press items, 1959 to 1966; the Swiss state records), kept by the family for sixty years, in four languages from eight countries. Twelve are public at /archive/.
• The tellerElisabeth Hitz, granddaughter of the heiress, author of the memoir, sole rights holder. Investigating the case since 2014.