The tragic conclusion to the Lindbergh baby kidnapping unfolded on May 12, 1932, when the infant's remains were discovered in Hopewell, New Jersey, not even a mile from where the Lindbergh family lived. Devastated by the loss, the Lindberghs left the area for good, ultimately donating their home to charity.

It had all started on March 1, 1932. That evening, Anne Lindbergh, married to famed aviator Charles Lindbergh, discovered that their baby was gone — and in his place was a note demanding $50,000 in ransom. Investigators quickly determined that the kidnapper had climbed a ladder to reach the child's second-floor bedroom. After that, silence — until three days later, when a second note arrived, this time raising the demand to $70,000.

What followed was an agonizing stretch of silence from the kidnapper. The Lindberghs waited in torment, and the entire nation waited with them. Help was offered from every corner of the country — even jailed mob boss Al Capone volunteered his assistance. At last, on April 2, new instructions arrived detailing how to deliver the ransom money. The family wasted no time complying, and the kidnapper responded with a claim that the baby could be found aboard a boat somewhere off the coast of Massachusetts. But when authorities searched, no boat matching the description turned up.

Then came the devastating discovery on May 12: the child's body was found. He had actually been killed the very night he was taken. By the time his mother had come across that first ransom note, the baby was already dead.

For a long stretch, it seemed as though the crime might go unsolved forever. That changed in late 1934, when a gas station attendant grew suspicious of a customer and jotted down his license plate number, passing it along to police. The bill the man had used to pay turned out to be one of the marked bills from the ransom payment. Authorities swiftly arrested the kidnapper, a man by the name of Bruno Hauptmann. In what became known as "the trial of the century," Hauptmann was found guilty. He was executed in April of 1936.