The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1906-04-23
IS ]. N. BULLOCK
DEAD Or ALIVE?
Investigations Have Been in
Vain; All Clues Come
to Naught.
JORDAN RIVER DRAGGED,
WITH NO RESULTS
Relatives and Officials Left in
Dark as to Whereabouts
of Missing Man.

Where is j. NJ. Bullock? Is he dead
or alive? Are the alleged clues as to
his fate, which have been so mye-
teriously discovered and SO mysterious
ly furnished to the police, real clues or
tho fruits of some faker's imagination?
These are the questions which the baf-
fled authorities and the anxious friends
and relatives of the missing man are
asking, and asking In vain.
Story of the Hat.
Take tho story OF the hat-it's a
queer story. There's something about
Il that savors of invention 1t don't
ring right. Why should Bullock, weak
and sick as he declared himself to be
when he sought the refuge of the city
prison and the doctors attention last
Monday-why should he travel between
four and fye miles outside the city to
find a suitable spot at which TO end his
life? Footsore and weary as he must
have been, II In reality, he did start on
that long tramp, he might have thrown
himself into the swirling waters of the
river Jordan at least two miles above
tho point where the hat was found,
bearing scrawled upon Its brim the la
comic inscription: Il am Bullock. L
am dead"
His Strange Action.
Why did he make that long, unneces-
sary Journey? Why, il he intended to
tell the world that he had destroyed
himself was he not more explicit?
1t Is a strange story. this story of the
disappearance of j. NJ. Bullock. and 1t
IS the very dearth of reasonable clues
that drive the police and other investi-
gators to follow UP those which are
highly unreasonable. 1t was this that
sent them Sunday morning 10 the far
away spot where a certain woman
says a certain man found a certain hat
bearing the above inscription. There
just above the Petit dam. only a
short distance from the rivers mouth.
they sounded dragged and dynamted |
the stream all day long,
Willing Hands Assisted.
Sergeant John Roberts and Detectives
Dick Shannon and Howard Wilson had |
charge of the work, but score of WILL |
ling hands assisted them I'm the strenu-
Gus days work. Two brothers and a |
score of friends of the missing man ac-
companicd the party and no suggestion
from any of them went unheeded by
those conducting the search c. Da-
vles, T. Smoot and ] Brown, experts
in the handling of explosives, placed
their dynamite shots wherever directed
thoroughly covering the bed of the
river from point above the spot where
the hat was found 10 the dam, beyond
which It Is a certainty no drowned
body could pass?
Results We're Disappointing.
The result was-nothng. The muddy |
waters of the river yielded no indica- |
tion that It's depths held the object OF |
the searchers' quest, Mike Gavin, the |
man who says he found the hat, did |
not appear TO aid the authorities whom |
he had set on, though the operations |
We're conducted within a short distance |
of his home and many Of his ncighbors |
were present. In travelling both to |
and from the scene of the search the |
police patrol wagon and other vehicles |
passed within a few feet of Gavin's |
door but the finder Of the hat was in
visible TO the naked eye Where was |
he? 1t Is considered reasonable to sup |
pose that a man so jealous In laud-
able cause as he had been when he
told the tale that set police and press |
at work on the hat clue. would certain
ly be present to assist them with his |
Information and advice when they pro-
ceeded to follow out the suggestions
which his story contained. But he
wasn't there. Why?
Again, the Strange Hat
AS for the hat itself. no friend or
relative of Bullock ever saw him wear
1t. That fact, however, is easily ex
planned. He entered and left the city
prison week ago bareheaded, 1t is
more than likely that his first act on |
leaving the jail was to purchase a hat.
Whether the one picked up on the river
bank was the one he bought has not |
yet developed. An effort to determine
this matter will be made today by |
canrnssing the hat stores In the i'm |
mediate vicinity of the prison.
Meantime the sorrowing relatives
continue to fret and worry over the |
strange disappearance and the appar-
emily unsolvable mystery surrounding |
Bullock's whereabouts. Where is he? !
Is he dead or aliYe2