Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 56, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 March 1899 — “CURTAIN-FACED" MAN DEAD. [ARTICLE]

“CURTAIN-FACED" MAN DEAD.

Puzzle of Scientists in Life Remains a Mystery. Michael Kelley, who for twenty-five years was the puzzle of scientists, the fright of children and, in fact, the strangest case Bellevue (New York) hospital ever had, died the other day in that institution. He was known as “The Cur-tain-faced Man.” Upon his head, neck and face, long stringy bits of flesh grew, forming a fringe of living tissue. The nature or composition of the growth was never determined, the physicians and surgeons being content with the generic name of tumor to designate Kelley’s malady. The pathologists hoped in death to reveal the significance of the grewsome spectacle, but in this they were thwarted, for wealthy relatives claimed the body, preventing under the peculiar provisions of the State autopsy law the performance of a post-mortem examination.