The Leatherman

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A man traveling around an area of the eastern U.S. got a lot of attention due to his odd attire. He wore leather pants, a shirt, a jacket, a scarf, a bag, a hat, and boots. All of these were made by stitching together by hand pieces of leather. All of it weighed about 217 kilograms (478 pounds). He would answer people monosyllabically or in one-word responses. He also used a lot of gestures. He spoke fluently in French and a French prayer book was found in his bag. Residents who encountered him saw that he followed the same route and covered about 600 kilometers(372.8 miles) annually between the Connecticut and Hudson Rivers. As soon as he reached a certain point he would turn around and walk back in the direction he had come. People got used to the wanderer and began to calculate the date of his next arrival. The women would bake extra bread for him and the men would share their chewing tobacco with him. The leatherman traveled the same road for 32 years. One day he disappeared and he was soon found dead in one of the local caves. The cause of death was oral cancer. He was buried in Sparta Cemetery in Ossining, New York. In 2011 it was decided to exhume his remains and move them to a new cemetery. But no traces of him were found. Only a few nails from the coffin.