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| James Kidd |
It is an undeniable, if slightly depressing, fact that the vast majority of humans go through life in an anonymous, unremarkable way and exit this world without leaving more than the most temporary of footprints. However, now and then one finds an individual who is completely forgotten for long after their death, only to make a mark on history in some thoroughly Strange Company-style fashion.
This post pays tribute to one of those innovative souls.
In September 1920, a man named James Kidd wandered into Miami, Arizona, where he found work at the Miami Copper Company, doing the dull, if necessary, work of keeping the wastewater pumps running. All anyone ever learned of his past was that he was born in Ogdensburg, New York in 1878. Although Kidd earned a decent enough salary, he chose to live as if he were penurious. He lived on park benches, seemed to live on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and traveled by hopping freight trains, hobo-style. He led an extremely solitary life, with no known spouse, relatives, or even real friends. He never got a driver’s license or served in the military, all of which meant that he generated virtually no administrative records. It was said that he liked to play the stock market and did some minor prospecting. Despite his oddities, the very few people who knew Kidd found him to be an intelligent and likable man.
In 1941, Kidd was injured on the job by a defective pump. Several days later, while back at work, he suffered a sudden loss of “strength or mental condition,” causing him to lose consciousness. He asked for workers’ compensation, but since he failed to file a report immediately after his accident with the pump, the claim was denied. Kidd then retired and moved to Phoenix, where he rented a modest $4 a week apartment. His quiet existence became more anonymous than ever.
On November 8, 1949, Kidd borrowed a pickaxe from a neighbor, saying that he would be visiting a couple of claims he had made in the Miami area. The next morning at 6 a.m., Kidd left his apartment and got into a waiting car. The car drove off, and that is the last we know of James Kidd. It remains a complete mystery who was driving the car, where it went, and how, when, and where Kidd eventually died. This eccentric loner essentially drove into oblivion, which may have been a fate to his liking.
Thanks to Kidd’s reclusive ways, it was not until December 29th that his landlord felt compelled to inform the police of his tenant’s disappearance. When police searched Kidd’s apartment, all seemed in order, with no clues as to what had become of him. However, they did find something unexpected: Despite his spartan existence, Kidd was a man of some means. His checkbook indicated that he had over $3800 in a local bank, and had received a dividend check for nearly $400 that he had yet to deposit. It seems that Kidd's minor forays into prospecting and the stock market made him a decent profit.
Kidd remained missing, and the sad truth is there was no one to really care what had happened to him. The investigation into his disappearance was quickly abandoned, and he was declared dead in 1954.
It was not until two years later, when Arizona passed the Uniform Disposition of Unclaimed Property Act, that Kidd’s story took an unexpectedly lively turn. The Act required that all property that had been unclaimed for seven years be turned over to the state within ninety days. Arizona’s Estate Tax Commissioner, Geraldine Swift, suddenly had to sort through a backlog of unclaimed estates…including that of James Kidd.
Initially, it seemed that there was little to document about Kidd’s affairs. Then, Swift was given the contents of a safe deposit box Kidd had rented. At first, the items seemed of little interest--a few old photographs, the transcript of his workers' compensation hearing, and several stock sell orders. However, when Swift opened a thick envelope marked “Buying slips from E.F. Hutton Company,” she found that the missing man had actually owned thousands of shares of stocks, many of which were still issuing dividends. In short, Kidd had left a considerable sum of money behind him.
Swift did her conscientious best to locate any relatives who might have a claim on this unexpectedly handsome estate, even going so far as to hire private detectives to search for heirs. None were ever found.
Swift kept Kidd’s ever-growing assets in limbo until February 1963, when it was decided to finally turn it over to the state of Arizona. Before doing so, she wanted to make one final check of Kidd’s safe deposit box, just in case something had been overlooked. During the inventory, Swift--for the first time--began sorting through Kidd’s many buying slips. Hidden within them was a piece of notebook paper which turned out to be James Kidd’s will.
He had written, “This is my first and only will and is dated the second of January, 1946. I have no heirs and have not been married in my life and after all my funeral expenses have been paid and one hundred dollars to some preacher of the gospel to say farewell at my grave sell all my property which is all in cash and stocks with E.F. Hutton Co. Phoenix, some in safety deposit box, and have this balance money to go in a research or some scientific proof of a soul of the human body which leaves at death I think in time there can be a Photograph of soul leaving the human at death. James Kidd.”
Well. Geraldine Swift’s job suddenly got a lot more interesting. Not quite knowing what to do with this unusual testament, she consulted the Attorney General’s office. Most of the staff were of the opinion that the will was probably invalid and was best ignored, but Swift seems to have developed a sort of protective fondness for her absent client. She insisted that his last wishes, however unusual they may have been, should be honored.
The whole question of how best to proceed was tossed in the lap of Arizona Superior Court Judge Robert Myers. Myers eventually ruled that the will was valid, and, in June 1967, held formal hearings on the issue of how Kidd’s wealth--which had by then grown to over $174,000--should be distributed. Not surprisingly, Myers’ court was deluged with letters from people all over the world declaring that they were the ones best qualified to carry out experiments in soul-searching. The claimants were a wild mix of sincere paranormal researchers, cranks, and grifters who saw the chance for making a quick buck. It seemed like everybody and their grandfather wanted to prove the existence of a soul. The long-gone recluse James Kidd was suddenly making international newspaper headlines.
After weeks of some of the most curious testimony ever offered in a probate hearing, Judge Myers finally issued a decision on October 20, 1967.
He wrote, “Considering the language of the last will and testament of the deceased as a whole, it was the intention and desire of the deceased that the residue and remainder of his estate be used for the purpose of research which may lead to some scientific proof of a soul of the individual human which leaves the body at death…It is incumbent on the Court to ensure that the residue and remainder of the estate of the deceased be used in such a manner as to benefit mankind as a whole to the greatest degree possible.
“This can be best accomplished by the distribution of the said funds for the purpose of research which may lead to some scientific proof of a soul of the individual human which leaves the body at death…Such research can be best done in the combined field of medical science, psychiatry, and psychology, and can best be performed and carried on by the Barrow Neurological Institute, Phoenix, Arizona.”
Inevitably, all the losing petitioners appealed the decision, with the result that on January 19, 1971, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled against the Barrow Neurological Institute. The case was sent back to Judge Myers, with the instructions that he must choose one of four other claimants. On July 17, Judge Myers decided that the lucky winner would be New York’s American Society for Psychical Research.
In the end, no one really profited from Kidd’s estate other than the lawyers involved, who received about one-third of the money. The rest of the cash went into a number of different experiments and studies of deathbed experiences, all of which left the question of “Is there a human soul?” unresolved.
As far as I know, the researchers weren’t even able to contact the spirit of James Kidd to ask what the hell happened to him.
