Old Leatherman

BoingBoing this week linked to a story in the New York Times about "Leather Man" - a vagabond who walked the roads of western Connecticut in the late 19th century.  That reminded me of a link I've saved from last year, in the Housatonic Times, recounting his story:

From 1856 to about 1882, he roamed the countryside until he began a now-famous clockwise circuit of 365 miles every 34 days, a route he followed for about seven years until his death in 1889...

“What we do know is that as people got to know him, they feared him less and less and opened their homes to the Leatherman. It became an honor to feed him. People would miss church socials if they knew he was going to come through town, and these weren’t just ordinary townsfolk. Pretty prominent people helped him as well.”

Ms. Sutton said tanneries often left good scrap leather out for the Leatherman to use in repairing his suit, while townspeople left out food, tobacco and even money...

He was referred to as old, Ms. Sutton speculates, due to his grimy appearance and depressed demeanor. His clothing was pieced together out of small pieces of leather, stitched with wider strips of leather, which was worn over woolen underclothes...

The modern controversy centers around whether his body should be exhumed from its current mislabeled pauper's grave, subjected to forensic testing, and relocated to a different site. You can read about that at the NYT or BoingBoing.