By Terry Richards
terry.richards@gaflnews

VALDOSTA — The faces of a mother and son who have been missing from Lowndes County for 22 years will soon be on gas pump screens around Georgia and Florida.

The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, together with media partner GSTV, will feature the mother and son on pump screens at more than 2,800 gas stations around the two states through the end of October, the center said in a statement.

Paula Wade, then 25, was last seen Oct. 12, 2002, leaving her job at Sam’s Club. By Oct. 14, her family was receiving calls that she had never shown up for work.

Her son, Brandon, then age 3, vanished with her.

Paula Wade moved to Valdosta with her husband. In the Air Force, he was assigned to Moody Air Force Base. They had their son, Brandon, but the marriage failed.

Brandon’s father is not a person of interest in the case, according to police in past interviews. He continued serving in the military and has served overseas, according to police.

By the time of October 2002, he was assigned to another military base out of state. Brandon’s father/Paula’s ex-husband has always cooperated in the investigation, according to the Valdosta Police Department.

Paula had worked a few years at Sam’s Club. She and Brandon lived with one of her friends in an apartment at The Commons. She drove a 1998 Chevy Blazer, according to family reports.

Paula was not known to be part of a party crowd, according to police.

She was not a person to suddenly leave town. She was a good employee at work. She was making plans to move from Valdosta, returning home to her parents in Florida. She contacted her parents regularly at least once a week. There is no known reason why she would feel compelled to suddenly disappear, according to police.

In 2023, Paula and Brandon were listed on the FBI’s missing persons page.

The family “has hope we are going to find them,” she said. “We have a strong faith, and miracles have happened before,” Paula’s sister, Mary Ramsbottom, said in a prior interview.

The FBI asks anyone with information on the Wades’ disappearance to contact the FBI’s Atlanta Field Office at (770) 216-3000 or submit a tip online at tips.fbi.gov.

Anyone with information may call the Valdosta Police Department’s investigation bureau, (229) 293-3145; or the VPD’s anonymous tip line, (229) 293-3091.