Walter Dowdle was on his way to lunch in Alexander City, Ala., when he took the call.

Crime scene tape outlines a section of riverbank near where Lon Dowdle's body was found Wednesday. Friends who came from Alabama conducted the search. (Patrick Reddy photos) | ZOOM |

        It was noon April 4. His son, Lon, 26, had failed to show up for an 11 a.m. golf outing with clients in Cincinnati.

        Missing an important business appointment was not like his reliable, outgoing son, the youngest of his three and the one whom he considered his best friend.

        The one he hunted deer and pheasants with nearly every weekend.

        “I dropped everything,” said Mr. Dowdle, 55, owner of Madix Inc., an international fixtures company. “I knew something was horribly wrong.”

        After six days of searching, his son's body was discovered Wednesday afternoon in the Ohio River. His death appears to be an accidental drowning, unless toxicology tests prove otherwise, Kenton County Coroner David Suetholz said Thursday after performing an autopsy.

        Toxicology results are expected in about 10 days.

        Last week, Mr. Dowdle knew to call John Dark, his son's childhood buddy, who moved to Fairfield in January. If anyone knew where his son was, it would be Mr. Dark.

Dowdle

        But Mr. Dark, an underwriter at Cincinnati Financial was as worried as Mr. Dowdle. The two, he said, had been bar hopping that night. Lon, Mr. Dark tearfully explained, vanished about 2:30 a.m. after going around the corner of the Waffle House in Covington. He said the men were inebriated.

        Mr. Dowdle said he immediately knew he had to come to Covington to search.

        Robert Rumsey, 26, of Sylacauga, Ala., was one of three friends who found the body Wednesday. He said he had searched that area twice and found the body on the third search.

        Police also scoured the area by boat, but said it would have been hard to see the body in the mud unless they were on foot.

        He was about a half-mile from the Holiday Inn in Covington, where he was staying. He was lying face down in the mud, his wallet in his pants pocket — cash and credit cards intact — his silver Rolex on his left wrist.

        More than 20 of Lon's friends and family members had flocked to Northern Kentucky to search for him. Many of the friends were Lon's fraternity brothers from Beta Theta Pi at Auburn University.

        After arriving in town late April 4, relatives set up a command station at the Holiday Inn, where they bonded with the staff. Strangers pitched in.

        “It's as simple as this: God forbid that this would ever happen to my family or one of my brothers,” said David Cain, 31, who owns the Wireless Store, a cellular telephone business.

Derrick Davison of Birmingham, Ala., was one of three searchers who found his friend's body. (Patrick Reddy photos) | ZOOM |

        He gave the family a printer, seven ITcell phones and his Kinko's card to use at the Fourth Street store in downtown Cincinnati.

        Some local residents who helped search are going to Alabama to attend funeral services Sunday at First United Methodist Church in Alexander City.

        Lon would have turned 27 Sunday.

        “His father called me and said they found the body,” said Carolyn Romanowski, 37, of Anderson Township. She joined the search last Friday and is flying to Alabama Saturday.

        “He said, “We love you, Carolyn. We feel like we have gotten really close with you. I said, “We love you, too.'”

        Three years ago, Lon married his high school sweetheart, Monique; the couple has no children.

        He worked at his father's business as a sales representative after earning a degree in marketing in 1998 at Auburn. He frequently visited the Tristate on business, usually with his wife, a watercolor and oil painter who has exhibited her work in Mount Adams.

        She would have been with him this time, she said, but she stayed home to finish paintings for an upcoming show in Birmingham, Ala.

        “If I had been there, I wouldn't have let him stay out that late,” Mrs. Dowdle, 27, said.

        Saying he was anxious to clear his name, Mr. Dark took a polygraph test Tuesday and told the Enquirer Wednesday he passed it. He said he blames himself for his friend's disappearance because he wasn't with him when he went behind the restaurant.

        Instead, he waited to get Lon's change for a $5 cab drive from a $20. Police have talked with the cab driver, who backed up Mr. Dark's story.

        Covington police confirmed Thursday that Mr. Dark passed his polygraph but are considering giving him a second one when he returns from Lon's funeral next week.

        There remain unanswered questions — chiefly how Lon's body wound up in the river from the restaurant, which is about a city block away.
       

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