Though he still had not located the missing plaques late yesterday afternoon, Jones did pinpoint when and where the awards had slipped off the radar screen. In his attempt to track down the missing plaques, he watched tapes from the hotel’s security cameras.

“We know that [the plaques] got to the hotel because they have it on video,” he said. “After that, though, somebody must have misplaced them.”

An employee of the Charles, who would not give his name, said after examining the videotape he thought the box might well have been accidentally tossed aside.

“My best guess is that they have been thrown away,” he said.

If the plaques are not found by the end of the day today, Jones said, the Shorenstein Center will simply have new ones made up—the Center has plenty of extra blank certificates, he said.

Jones said he’s still not exactly sure how the boxes got lost in the shuffle and said he remains doubtful the precise circumstances surrounding the disappearance will ever be discovered.

“I don’t know if we’ll ever know what happened,” he said.

And for the time being, neither will the recipients. According to the reservations desk at the Charles, they all checked out yesterday afternoon.

—Staff writer Amit R. Paley contributed to the reporting of this story.