Missing 50 years: Diane Prevost was just 2 years old when she disappeared

The last time Lise Nastuk saw her little sister, she was playing in the sand on the shores of Grundy Lake. That was 50 years ago this Saturday.

Two-year-old Diane Prevost disappeared from the beach, and no trace has ever been found.

“You can’t describe what it’s like to grow up with this hole in your life where your sister should be,” said Lise. “Diane was so little when she disappeared — we never really got to know each other as sisters.”

The weekend started out like so many before, the girls and their two older siblings packed in the car with parents Bernard and Claire for the drive from their home in Sudbury to Grundy Lake Provincial Park, just over an hour away, where they were camping with Bernard’s parents.

On Saturday, the family headed to the beach. While her dad fished and the other kids played near the shore searching for frogs, Diane — who was terrified of the water — asked to go back to her grandparents’ camp site about 500 feet away.

Her dad said he would take her. In the time it took Bernard to untangle a fishing line, the toddler vanished. After discovering she wasn’t at the camp site or anywhere nearby, a search was launched.

Over the next month, dozens of police and military members, bloodhounds, aircraft and scuba divers scoured the park and lake for the little girl.

They never found her.

For five decades, her family has searched, questioned, and been left without answers. Her dad passed away in 2015, never knowing what happened to his baby. But her mom and siblings Claude, Joanne, Lise, and Richard — born after she disappeared — still feel her absence.

“This family has spent a lifetime searching for Diane. And that makes sense. When do you stop searching, stop hoping? You don’t,” said Christy Dzikowicz, Director of MissingKids.ca at the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. “A toddler doesn’t just disappear on her own and leave no trace for 50 years. If someone knows anything about what happened that day, it’s time to come forward.”

The family created www.DianePrevost.info, filled with information about her missing persons case and photos of their lives — a notice to Diane that if she is looking for her family, they are waiting for her return.

Diane’s case remains open with the OPP.

“The OPP never closes missing person investigations unless they are resolved. We appeal to the public, to anyone who may have information, to call in with it. It might be the missing piece,” says Detachment Commander Staff Sergeant Mike Gordon of West Parry Sound OPP.

The Canadian Centre for Child Protection is appealing to anyone who remembers anything about Diane’s disappearance that September weekend in 1966 to contact MissingKids.ca at 1-866-KID-TIPS (543-8477) and help this family find the answers they’ve waited for so long.

“I hope every day that she’s out there somewhere, that maybe someone took her and she has had a good life,” Lise said. “I still have hope, even if it’s been 50 years since I saw her.”