In 1968, while a student at Emory College, Barbara Jane Mackle was
kidnapped and buried alive in a plywood box containing food, water, and
pipes leading to the outside air. The kidnappers demanded $500,000 in
ransom, which Mackle's parents paid. She was rescued three and a half
days later, and her captors were arrested and sent to prison. Her story
was first told in the TV movie
The Longest Night (1972). She wrote her own account in
1971, and this book served as the basis for another TV movie:
83 Hours 'Til Dawn (1990).
