David Francis and Brian Swanson are separated by 181 miles and 20 years but connected by heartache no father should have to bear. Each has searched for a lost son.  Francis, who lives in Stillwater, spent more than a year looking for his son, Jon, who disappeared while climbing in Idaho's Sawtooth Mountains in 2006.

Now Francis is helping Swanson, of Marshall, Minn., find his son.  Nineteen-year-old Brandon Swanson was returning home May 14 after a party in Canby, Minn., when his car went into a ditch on a gravel road. He called home at 1:54 a.m. and asked his parents to pick him up near Lynd. He said he would walk toward town.

As Brian and Annette Swanson drove toward Lynd, Brian talked to Brandon on his cell phone.  "I talked to him for 47 minutes, and all of a sudden, he said, 'Oh, s—-!' and the phone went dead," Brian Swanson said.  It was 3:10 a.m.

"We haven't been able to get in contact with him since," he said.  The Swansons kept calling but got his voice mail. About 6:30 a.m., they called the sheriff's office and reported their son missing.

They've been searching ever since. David Francis is convinced Brandon will be found.

"We'll find him. We'll find Brandon," he said. "But it's harder than we thought it would be. ... The ground teams have not found a single clue. We have no article of clothing, have no footprints, have no clear idea which direction he was traveling."

David Francis said he is focusing on the moment that Brandon's phone cut off.  "I'm looking for the 'Oh, s---!' spot," he said. "Where in his walk he might have slipped into the river, an abandoned cistern or a trench. I'm looking for the spot where we believe we had a mishap."


ADVICE, COMFORT

David Francis and his wife, Linda, joined the search for Brandon around Memorial Day. A volunteer who had helped them search for Jon was helping the Swansons, too, and he put the families in touch with each other. After Jon disappeared in July 2006, the Francis family launched the Jon Francis Foundation, which is dedicated to getting information and advice to families searching for people missing in the wild.

David Francis, 64, is a former Navy captain and retired businessman who ran unsuccessfully for the Minnesota Senate in 2006. To help in the search for Jon, he raised money, took search-and-rescue classes, bought equipment and learned to climb. Two mountain guides found Jon's body in July 2007 on Grand Mogul Mountain, about 1,500 feet below the summit Jon had climbed.

The Francis’ have visited the Swansons three times and regularly communicate with the couple and offer advice. They made the trip to southwestern Minnesota again last weekend and helped organize a massive search that included 114 volunteers.

The official search for Brandon was called off six days after he disappeared. The Francis’ helped make "Missing" posters and suggested ways to organize food and water for volunteers and to raise money for the "Search for Brandon Swanson" fund. They also put the Swansons in touch with canine search teams and a professionally trained search manager, Gary Peterson, who is leading the search for Brandon.

When David Francis spotted Brian Swanson writing checks at the search headquarters last weekend, he said: "Brian, you've got to get a treasurer."  David Francis' organizational and search-and-rescue skills have been invaluable, Brian Swanson said, and Linda Francis has been a comforting presence.

"They've been very supportive. They talked with us, they listened to us," Brian Swanson said.

"Emotionally, that has really helped. Coming from somebody who has gone through this terrible situation. I hope nobody else ever has to go through this — I wish it would never happen again to anybody. It's just so painful."

Annette Swanson said she immediately felt better after talking to Linda Francis for the first time.

"When you're thrown into this — and you're literally just thrown into this — there's not a lot of people, especially in our rural area, who can comprehend what this is and how difficult it is," she said. "To be able to connect with Linda was such a comfort. Unfortunately, she's been through it, but that enabled her to offer words of advice, words of comfort and just be there."

Linda Francis said both women cried during their first phone conversation. "I said, 'This is crummy. Nobody should have to go through this, but here we are,' " Francis said. "I just validated what she was feeling — been there, done that. It's just important to show up. That's the important part. Just to show up, and hold her hand, and give her a hug."

'BE SAFE'

Annette Swanson said her greatest fear is that people will forget her son.

"I want people to remember Brandon," she said. "Talk about Brandon. Brandon is a real person. He touched a lot of lives, and don't forget him."

He has a smile that lights up his whole face, his mother said, and is big-hearted and kind and really believed in doing the right thing.

Brandon graduated from Marshall High School in 2007 and spent the past school year studying wind energy at Minnesota West Community College in Canby. He planned to transfer this fall to Iowa Western Community College in Council Bluffs, Iowa, and major in science.

On May 13, Brandon went to Lynd to visit friends and then drove to Canby to say goodbye to another friend from school. He was wearing baggy jeans, a blue-striped polo shirt, a black hooded sweat shirt, a white Twins baseball cap, wire-rimmed glasses and a silver necklace.

Brian Swanson, 44, was taking a class in St. Cloud on May 13, so only Annette was home when Brandon popped in to say goodbye. The couple also has a daughter, Jamine, 17, who just graduated from Marshall High School.

"I said the things I normally say to him," Annette said. " 'See you later.  " 'Be safe.' "


TRAGIC ACCIDENT LIKELY

Saturday marked the one-month anniversary of Brandon's disappearance.

When Brandon called his parents May 14, he said he had crashed his green Chevy Lumina outside Lynd, a small town southwest of Marshall. As the Swansons drove toward Lynd, and Brian and Brandon talked by cell phone, Brandon said he was getting impatient and would meet them in Lynd. He talked about walking on a gravel road, taking a shortcut through a field and hearing water running.

After tracing Brandon's last cell phone call to a cell phone tower in Minneota, officials found Brandon's car about 2:30 p.m. near Taunton, about 30 miles from Lynd.

Since then, hundreds of volunteers have searched for Brandon, using cadaver dogs, horses, boats and ultralight aircraft. For the most part, the search has concentrated on areas in and around the Yellow Medicine River.

Since Brandon's car was found near the Lincoln-Lyon county line, law enforcement officials from both counties were involved in the search. Officials say there is no evidence of foul play or that Brandon staged his own disappearance.

"If I had to lay any money down, I'd say we're missing him somewhere in the water," said Lyon County Sheriff Joel Dahl. "He's in an eddy somewhere, being held down by a log. He's got to be here. Everything is consistent that he was walking and something happened to him."

Lincoln County Sheriff Jack Vizecky said Brandon was likely the victim of a tragic accident. If Brandon, who was 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighed about 125 pounds, went into the Yellow Medicine River, it could take weeks for the body to emerge from the cold water, he said.

"I would say every day that goes by, hope is extremely diminished," Vizecky said. "I would like to bring some closure to the family."

Vizecky said the Jon Francis Foundation's involvement in the search has been helpful. "It's certainly given us the ability to look longer," he said. "We've had more eyes and ears since we had to formally stop this. We want to find Brandon, and that's the whole thing."

"I just keep thinking he's got to be out there somewhere," Annette Swanson said. "We want to bring him home."

"We're going to keep looking," said Brian Swanson. "That's all we can do until we find him. There's no way I could stop until I know where he is. Either way it ends, it's closure."

LIGHT LEFT ON FOR HIM

Brian Swanson said no large organized search would be held this weekend, the first without one since Brian's disappearance. He, however, will be out looking.

It is Father's Day, after all, and he wants to be with his son.  "It is awful," he said. "Every day has been awful, to be honest with you.  "But we're going to find him eventually, and hopefully, he'll be OK. Maybe somebody's found him, and they're taking care of him, and they don't know he's missing."

But after more than a month, reality is setting in.  "If he's no longer with us, which, unfortunately, is the most likely scenario, that hurts," Brian Swanson. He said he gets some comfort from knowing that Brandon "really enjoyed the life that he lived."

Annette Swanson said she clings to a thread of hope that Brandon is alive.  "I do still hope," she said.
"There are times when I think maybe I don't, and then, all of a sudden, somebody says something, and I'll think, 'but he could still be out there.' Sometimes I surprise myself with it."

But she has stopped searching.  "I just can't be the one who should come across him," she said. "That's not how I want to remember him."

Annette Swanson has gone back to work at Southwestern Center for Independent Living in Marshall. Brian, who previously worked in construction, is studying to be an insurance salesman.

Jamine's high-school graduation party, originally scheduled for the end of May, will be held next month.

"We're very proud of her, of course, and Brandon, if he were here, he would be, too," Annette Swanson said. "We felt that her reception should be a time of celebration for her, for her achievements. We're hoping that in (mid-July) that that's what it can be — a celebration for her."

In the meantime, the Swansons will leave the porch light on for their son. It's been burning since May 14.

"That morning when we left, we turned the porch light on for him," Annette Swanson said. "Well, we haven't turned it off since. We're leaving it on till he comes home."

The Swansons hope other families in Marshall will do the same.

"We want to continue to remind people that he's still missing and that we're working so hard to bring him home," she said.

"Turn your porch lights on for him and light his way."

One hundred and eighty-one miles away in Stillwater, David and Linda Francis have an automatic porch light that comes on when the sun goes down. So no, Linda said, they have not turned on a porch light for Brandon.

"We wait and sit on the same bench together," she said.

Mary Divine can be reached at 651-228-5443.