389: The Connecticut Leatherman

A 19th century mystery traveler makes his way across the northeast in legendary fashion.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A walk to remember.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Jason Horton.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Rebecca Leib and this is Ghost Town.

[SPEAKER_00]: The mid-1850s was a tumultuous time in American history, conflict-over-slavery was intensifying, leading to what would become the civil war.

[SPEAKER_00]: Meanwhile, settlers were rapidly accelerating westward in a historic expansion that would also shape the course of history itself.

[SPEAKER_00]: But amongst the tension, the movement, the ambiguity, the emotion was a man.

[SPEAKER_00]: Always walking between New York City and Hartford.

[SPEAKER_00]: As a piece in the New York Times with later say, quote, The word strange hardly captures his strangeness.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was rough and hairy and he wandered around on back roads, sleeping in caves.

[SPEAKER_00]: Above all, he refused to explain himself.

[SPEAKER_00]: Where did he come from?

[SPEAKER_00]: Where was he going?

[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody knew, but many would hypothesize about a controversial, unknown man turned legend, turned larger than life urban myth.

[SPEAKER_00]: Today on Ghost Town, let me introduce you to the Connecticut Leatherman.

[SPEAKER_00]: Though the Connecticut Latherman was known for many things that we'll get into very soon, what struck me first was his route.

[SPEAKER_00]: The 365 mile loop you would make every five weeks for over 30 years.

[SPEAKER_00]: From 1857 to 1889, the Connecticut Latherman would take the same iconic circuit through the Northeastern United States.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was a 34-day long clockwise trip through Southwestern Connecticut and adjacent sections of Lower New York State.

[SPEAKER_00]: And adjacent sections of Lower New York State.

[SPEAKER_00]: The trips took him through Danbury, New Fairfield, Watertown, Middletown, and New Canaan into Westchester, New York, back to Danbury, and again to New Fairfield.

[SPEAKER_00]: He stopped for nothing, and walked summer through winter in every possible type of weather.

[SPEAKER_00]: Though the seasons would change on the Leatherman's route between the Connecticut River and the Hudson River, his attire during all of it did not.

[SPEAKER_00]: As you might have guessed, the Connecticut Leatherman wore leather from head to toe.

[SPEAKER_00]: And whatever you're imagining the Connecticut Leatherman to look like, I promise you, it is wrong.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Leatherman wore rough leather patches stitched together with long leather strips from his neck

[SPEAKER_00]: his outfit was stiff, awkward, aromatic, and brutally heavy.

[SPEAKER_00]: Think wearing a sleeping bag made of baseball gloves, and then walking all day, every day in it.

[SPEAKER_00]: He also wore a hat, a scarf, and shoes, all made of vinyl.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, just kidding, of course, it's leather, all leather.

[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, when people would give him scraps of leather on his roof, he'd have to incorporate it into what he was wearing.

[SPEAKER_00]: to anyone in the mid-1800s encountering the leatherman in their day-to-day, or anyone of any time I would imagine, he must have seemed almost unreal.

[SPEAKER_00]: Mythical, even.

[SPEAKER_00]: A massive dark brown form, creaking and squeaking and slashing in his own sweat with every step.

[SPEAKER_00]: Slowly making his way down a quiet

[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody knew him, nobody knew why he took his 300-plus-mal route, and especially why he wore what he wore.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was effectively a mystery and a weird one at that, and one who I can't imagine in any world would be comfortable, which added to the mystery, how could he endure this?

[SPEAKER_00]: He did this to himself, the leatherman was his own leatherman, bounded his own leather shackles.

[SPEAKER_00]: In the years following the Civil War, the leather bound bag abond became an object of course of curiosity, and then a frequent subject of local newspapers.

[SPEAKER_00]: Quote, I suppose that many of the readers of your valuable paper have heard of the old leather man, wrote someone from Rhine, New York, in 1870.

[SPEAKER_00]: Quote, hearing the reports about his singular recluse, I and company with others, paid his haunts of his it.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was in the press the fire of inquiry was fueled, and also that this individual was given his enduring name, the Leatherman, Old Leatherman, or the Connecticut Leatherman.

[SPEAKER_00]: An early article in the Burlington Free Press dated April 7, 1870, also referred to him as the leather-clad man.

[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever his name, whatever you want to call him, the newspapers were eager to share what they knew about him.

[SPEAKER_00]: Namely, his 365-mile loop repeated about every five weeks or so that he slept in curious caves and rock shelters and popped into towns for food and supplies as needed.

[SPEAKER_00]: The newspapers didn't have much to go off of.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Connecticut Lotherman spoke rarely, but when he did say something it would be simple, often monosolabic, in grunts and gestures, in English and in French.

[SPEAKER_00]: This made people speculate that he was from France, and the Connecticut rumor mill thought perhaps Picardy, a city in northern France.

[SPEAKER_00]: When asked about his background, he would abruptly end the conversation.

[SPEAKER_00]: Another mystery, nobody knows how the Connecticut Latherman earned his money.

[SPEAKER_00]: The money he spent when he'd stopped by local grocery stores to get supplies.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was a simple man when he enjoyed a nice little treat and perhaps a little buzz as one store record reflects.

[SPEAKER_00]: On that visit, the Latherman bought, quote, one loaf of bread, a can of sardines,

[SPEAKER_00]: one kill of brandy and a bottle of beer.

[SPEAKER_00]: I wholeheartedly approve.

[SPEAKER_00]: When the Connecticut Leatherman wasn't placing fun and grocery orders, he was hosted by curious townspeople.

[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone in Connecticut now knowing his rounds after, say, a decade or two knew exactly the pathway that he took.

[SPEAKER_00]: People would have food ready for him, which he often ate on their doorsteps.

[SPEAKER_00]: He would not accept shelter or money, but gladly took tobacco and leather scraps, of course, when offered.

[SPEAKER_00]: Ten towns along the Leatherman's route, past ordinances exempting him from the Connecticut State, tramplaw that was passed in 1879, a law that criminalized a vagrancy in a post-Sylwar America.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Leatherman truly became a beloved fixture in the North East.

[SPEAKER_00]: As the years passed, though, the Connecticut Leatherman went from colorful character to full-blown media phenomenon.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Hartford Globe published a front page article complete with a timetable of his travels.

[SPEAKER_00]: In small towns, people would line up to watch him pass, knowing of course that he was coming.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was like how people would watch say a marathon.

[SPEAKER_00]: If that marathon was one man limping around in a thick leather tuxedo.

[SPEAKER_00]: School teachers let their best student go outside to give the Lotherman food when he passed on quote Lotherman Day.

[SPEAKER_00]: And many eager to capitalize on this strange man offered postcards, photos, woodcuts and paintings timed to his circuit.

[SPEAKER_00]: But while the Connecticut Leatherman enjoyed generosity, tobacco, and anything to add to his leather obsession, he was not interested in the limelight.

[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, he went out of his way to avoid it.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Leatherman steered clear of the region's biggest cities, Hartford, Bridgeport, New Haven, and if someone asked too many questions, he'd walk away from them and never interact with them again.

[SPEAKER_00]: Once in Woodbury, Connecticut, someone presented the old leatherman with some recent articles about him.

[SPEAKER_00]: Quote, he grunted over them, the newspaper account read, but showed no enthusiasm at finding himself famous.

[SPEAKER_00]: This, of course, made people speculate even more.

[SPEAKER_00]: People wondered about his French accent, thinking he might be French or French Canadian or Portuguese.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some thought he came from a family and heart for a name brown, and the whole Frenchman

[SPEAKER_00]: he declined to meet on Fridays, giving rise to speculation that he was Roman Catholic.

[SPEAKER_00]: Others said he was immune to rattlesnake bites.

[SPEAKER_00]: The old leatherman, another claimed, was disguising himself to evade police.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was a fugitive, or a wealthy businessman, brought low by a fire, mourning the death of his fiance.

[SPEAKER_00]: The more he walked, the more people talked.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like I said before, the invitations, the Connecticut Leatherman received to sleep in people's houses and barns were offered, but never accepted, he preferred to sleep in caves and hollows.

[SPEAKER_00]: At a certain point, however, curious canedicutions found his hideaways, a few of which are still named after him.

[SPEAKER_00]: They are these onlookers got a whole new dimension of the mysterious Connecticut letter man.

[SPEAKER_00]: The cave sea dwells in were marbles within themselves, orderly, complete with primitive fireplaces, sleeping areas and stores of food, like food like meat and hickory nuts.

[SPEAKER_00]: In some of his forested nucks, he kept well-tended gardens.

[SPEAKER_00]: The leatherman had not only cultivated a persona, but in inner life, and resources all his own.

[SPEAKER_00]: that is until 1888.

[SPEAKER_00]: When the leatherman would make the transition from actual man to folk hero, more after this break.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, okay, okay, if you've listened to this far, I need you to wish our own favorite leatherman, just kidding, just kidding.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's very young and hot and sexy, Jason Horton, a happy birthday.

[SPEAKER_00]: This episode comes out on his birthday.

[SPEAKER_00]: He has a giant standup show, and I know he would love if you reached out

[SPEAKER_00]: rate, review anything you feel comfortable helping with.

[SPEAKER_00]: We'll take.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Clearly, we'll take it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Happy birthday Jason.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've been doing this a long time and I appreciate everything you do and everyone else does too, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: Right, everybody?

[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, okay.

[SPEAKER_00]: That being said, let's get back to the leatherman, shall we?

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, if we must.

[SPEAKER_00]: Despite being spared from the punishing vagabond laws of the time, ones that perpetuated widespread public panic about dangerous quote unquote, Trump's, the leatherman carried on.

[SPEAKER_00]: One note were the mysterious story about him, as told by writer Sam Anderson, who walked the leatherman's loop in 2024, and wrote about it for the New York Times,

[SPEAKER_00]: He said that his favorite incident in the old Leatherman cadre of stories happened in a small town called shrub oak.

[SPEAKER_00]: Where many Leatherman fans lived and helped him when he reached that point in the loop.

[SPEAKER_00]: One family called the Isolins, kept a special bowl and spoon just to feed the leather man.

[SPEAKER_00]: Down the street, at Dero's grocery store, the owner kept a note in his account book about the Connecticut Leatherman's trips through town.

[SPEAKER_00]: In February 1885, when the old leather man didn't show up on schedule, people worried.

[SPEAKER_00]: the weather had been terrible, rainy and freezing.

[SPEAKER_00]: A group from the town concerned went to check on the nearest cave, which was in the woods near the ruins of a sawmill.

[SPEAKER_00]: But on February 19th, the Connecticut Lotherman finally made his appearance.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was several days late and seemed to be

[SPEAKER_00]: Darrow the grosser motion for him to come inside, and, despite never coming inside or accepting any indoor invitations, he did.

[SPEAKER_00]: He sat down next to Darrow's fire, and Darrow gave him some cheese and crackers, and watched the old leatherman eat.

[SPEAKER_00]: At that point, he decided to try something.

[SPEAKER_00]: Darrow took out a pencil and a piece of paper.

[SPEAKER_00]: I am old, Dero said, and he wrote down his age.

[SPEAKER_00]: Then he passed the paper and pencil to the Connecticut Leatherman.

[SPEAKER_00]: How old are you, Dero asked?

[SPEAKER_00]: People had been trying to get this information forever.

[SPEAKER_00]: And today, somehow, the generosity, the cold, maybe it was just the right point in time, the Connecticut Leatherman responded.

[SPEAKER_00]: In large, crooked strokes, he wrote a string of numbers.

[SPEAKER_00]: One, five, three, four, two.

[SPEAKER_00]: A few days later, a local newspaper printed the Leatherman's answer, and, of course, all of the theories around it, they were debates about it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some thought the Leatherman must have been writing his birthday in European style, like 15342, or March 15th, 1842.

[SPEAKER_00]: This would have made him 42 years old.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some took it at face value as evidence that he was some kind of mythical creature, 15,342 years old.

[SPEAKER_00]: Decades later, the researcher Allison Alby offered this speculation.

[SPEAKER_00]: Quote, one guest being as good as another, perhaps the leather man, understanding neither the question or the meaning of Mr. Deros figures, showed his own peculiar method of writing 1,2,3,4,5.

[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe it was some kind of code, I don't know, we'll never know.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Connecticut Leatherman's last loop came in March of 1889.

[SPEAKER_00]: For months, it had been made clear that something was really wrong with him.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can see it in photos of the time.

[SPEAKER_00]: He seems sick.

[SPEAKER_00]: There are sores around his mouth.

[SPEAKER_00]: When the Connecticut Leatherman ate, he covered the sore with a special patch of, of course.

[SPEAKER_00]: Leather, one house he stopped at for breakfast belonged to a doctor in the Leatherman allowed him to examine his lip.

[SPEAKER_00]: The doctor gave him some ointment and he was on his way.

[SPEAKER_00]: Eventually, the sore ate away half of the Leatherman's jaw.

[SPEAKER_00]: At this point, you could hardly eat.

[SPEAKER_00]: He had to soak his food in coffee, then drink it, and some of it would come pouring right through his own face.

[SPEAKER_00]: His walking of course got slower, but he kept going.

[SPEAKER_00]: People along his loop decided to try something drastic to help him.

[SPEAKER_00]: When the Connecticut Letterman stopped for a meal, as he always did at the House of Amy Guy in Middleton, Connecticut, she sent a messenger two miles up the road to his next stop, the Fisher House.

[SPEAKER_00]: When the Leatherman showed up there, he encountered a group of strangers, the police chief, the town position, representatives of the Connecticut Humane Society, they, quote, arrested him benevolently, and put him into a carriage to take him to the hospital.

[SPEAKER_00]: According to one of the fishers, quote, he went with no reluctance and seemed to understand why, that the conversation was carried on by science mostly.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Connecticut Leatherman stayed at Hartford Hospital, but not for long.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was found to be sane, but with a quote, severe emotional affliction.

[SPEAKER_00]: As he was deemed sane, he had his own money, it was, again, never determined how, and that he clearly expressed he wanted freedom the hospital had to let him go.

[SPEAKER_00]: On March 24, 1889, approximately a year later, the body of the Leatherman was founded

[SPEAKER_00]: An autopsy revealed that he had died from mouth cancer, likely from his tobacco use.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oddly enough, and despite his hardened traveling lifestyle, he was found in remarkably good condition, while his face was frostbitten, he had not lost any fingers.

[SPEAKER_00]: His possessions was a French prayer book, and all, scissors, and axe, and an extra axe head.

[SPEAKER_00]: His leather outfit was weighed after his death.

[SPEAKER_00]: According to historian David Hoberman, Locals buried his remains in the popper section of Sparta's Cemetery in nearby Austin, New York.

[SPEAKER_00]: The original Tombstone Red.

[SPEAKER_00]: Final resting place of Jules Borglay, of Lyon, France, the Lotherman, who regularly walked a 365 mile route through Westchester and Connecticut from the Connecticut River to the Hudson, living in caves in the years.

[SPEAKER_00]: so was the Connecticut Leatherman Jules Borgle and who the hell was Jules Borgle and why did he choose to lead this unconventional life?

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, dead people labeled the Leatherman as such, perhaps to give themselves the closure they needed about his active yet solitary life.

[SPEAKER_00]: The best known theory, and one that circulated in the press during his death, and much of his lifetime, was that the Leatherman wasn't fact, Jewel's Borglay.

[SPEAKER_00]: Who was Borglay?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well he was the disgraced suitor of the daughter of one of France's foremost leather speculators.

[SPEAKER_00]: Having inadvertently brought about the financial ruin of his Beyoncé's family, Borglay fled France, mysteriously serviced in Connecticut, as first recorded appearance occurred in Hardwindid in 1858, and walked to ease the guilt, clad in leather shackles, romantic right, and kind of convenient in that Borglay did live in Connecticut and was seen, but according to historians, it's not quite right.

[SPEAKER_00]: According to researchers, including Dan W. Deluca, who wrote a book about the Leatherman, and the Leatherman's own New York death certificate, the identity of the Leatherman's still to this day remains unknown.

[SPEAKER_00]: On May 25, 2011, Deluca and the town's historical society were able to get a new headstone installed when the Leatherman's grave was moved in the

[SPEAKER_00]: But more importantly than the movements, to be some quieter, was why the, was when the grave was moved, the letterman's gravesite was actually exhumed.

[SPEAKER_00]: Researchers hope the exhumation might provide clues about the letterman's identity.

[SPEAKER_00]: Unfortunately, no human remains were recovered during the exhumation, only coffinails and soil from the original burial plot remained.

[SPEAKER_00]: Nicholas Bellatonie, a University of Connecticut Archaeologist and Supervisor of the Exhumation, cited that time, the effective traffic over the shallow original gravesite, and possible removal of gravesite material by a road-grading project, likely destroyed all hard and soft tissue in the grave.

[SPEAKER_00]: But was the leather suit still there?

[SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't find anything that said it wasn't, so I'm saying yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: After the grave was moved and situated, a simple stone marker was put up to commemorate it, a much different one than the one before.

[SPEAKER_00]: And keeping with the mystery, it to this day reads simply, the leather man.

[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, people still talk about the leather man, a figure firmly entrenched in east-coast culture.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Leatherman was a subject of a 1984 documentary, and his caves are still called Leatherman to locals.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Connecticut Leatherman even inspired a song by the American rock band Pearl Jam, called of course, Leatherman.

[SPEAKER_00]: But one of the most powerful legacies of the Connecticut Leatherman is his loop, a loop many choose to walk to feel closer to American history.

[SPEAKER_00]: Write her Sam Anderson, who shared some great anecdotes we've used in this episode, walked to the trail in 2024, and, like I've cited, wrote about it for the New York Times.

[SPEAKER_00]: He relates the experience of the walk as bringing old and new together, exploring oppositions, dichotomies, a symbol of how a human can exist on multiple planes, in a world so unaccepting as post-civil war America.

[SPEAKER_00]: So as Anderson quote, the town's people regarded the leatherman with a mix of closeness and distance, familiarity and alienation.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was the insider's outsider.

[SPEAKER_00]: He didn't belong but he was accepted.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wherever he went, he created a circle of civility.

[SPEAKER_00]: His loop tied together otherwise disparate communities like beads on a string.

[SPEAKER_00]: The tramp laws curiously didn't seem to apply to him.

[SPEAKER_00]: By tramping so openly, he seemed to transcend the category.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was in his own special category.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was the old, leather man.