MYSTERY MAN DEAD

Taranaki Daily News, 23 March 1935, Page 16 (Supplement)

MYSTERY MAN DEAD

STRANGE CAREER OF “PAPER JACK” “Paper Jack,” the mystery . man pl Croydon, London, with his paper raiment, is dead, but his story is a mystery no longer. For 15 years, the residents of Croydon had grown used to “Paper Jack’s' quaint figure, bare-armed, shoeless, clad only in newspapers and brown paper tied ■ about him with string. Nobody knew who he was. He was not a beggar. He always Refused proudly offers of food from charitable strangers. But actually he; was never hard up. In one of the many tiffs Jack carried on top of his paper costume were found his money and his personal papers. These papers proved he was Arthur Ellis Preece, , son of a wealthy estate agent, educated at Oxfordi .where, he had taken a degree; and a much-trav-elled man in former days. Preece had married a very ''beautiful woman;: Some time after his marriage he was seized with a mania for the Outdoor life. He began to live entirely in the garden of his house at Biggin Hill. He insisted that his wife should do likewise. She did for a time, but eventually, she felt she could not continue, and the marriage was dissolved Preece then took to the outdoor life in earnest, after selling his property at Biggin Hill. Preece vanished, to appear as “Paper Jack,” but to be identified as his true self only when a car accident ended his picturesque career. Preece was an architect stnd surveyor by profession. In the war he worked in a Government department dealing with ciphers and codes. One .of his eccentricities was never to use a towel after washing. He preferred to walk outdoors and let the sun dry him. Hi former wife is happily remarried to' at. accountant and has two children.