The (Somerton) Man Who Never Was.
The Somerton Man was a ghost.
………….
Nobody saw him arrive in Adelaide whether he did by car, train or plane.
The left luggage office didn’t remember him leaving his suitcase.
The bus ticket seller could not recollect him buying a ticket,
.. neither did the train ticket seller.
Nobody saw him leaving the train station.
He wasn’t seen waiting by a bus stop.
Nobody came forward to say they saw him travelling on the bus,
… or a train.
Nobody saw him entering a train or bus or leaving one.
Nobody saw him arriving at Henley Beach.
He wasn’t seen leaving Henley Beach.
Nobody spotted him arriving in Glenelg.
Nobody came forward to say he had bought a pasty at their shop on the night of the 30th.
Nobody saw him eating a pasty.
He wasn’t seen on the streets of Glenelg that day or that night.
He wasn’t seen arriving at Somerton Beach on the 30th.
Though busy with swimmers, nobody saw him descending the stairs to the beach.
Neither was he seen settling himself down on the sand.
Nobody thought it unusual to see a well dressed man choose the beach to sit rather than a bench only yards away.
Nobody saw him lighting up his cigarette.
Nobody saw him leave the beach to buy the pasty he was estimated to have eaten at about 10pm.
Nobody saw him return to the beach, climb back down the steps and lie down again in the same spot.
Alf Boxall didn’t know him.
Jessica Harkness did not admit to knowing him.
Prosper Thomson wasn’t asked.
Despite that he appeared to be suffering from several serious ailments he was not remembered as seeking medical advice at either a pharmacist, hospital or doctor’s surgery.
Chemist Freeman didn’t see him toss a Rubaiyat through the back window of his car,
and neither did anyone else.
Despite that his image was published worldwide, nobody came forward with any proof of his identity.
None of the witnesses who noticed him in the early evening saw his face.
He had nothing on him that would identify him.
There was nothing in his suitcase that would identify him.
His fingerprints were sent all English speaking countries including the FBI and all without success.
The Somerton Man .. 
Some may have seen him, but when they saw the “reconstructed” photo of him which was released to the press…
well, they hadn’t seen that guy who was in the papers, it was someone else they saw
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After he disembarked from Pan Am flight 835 at Mascot airport Sydney, Somerton man had to proceed to the Immigration desk. There he had to produce his passport which had his photo in it.
Immigration officials are trained to look closely at people’s faces and compare it with their passport photo. They would have remembered his face when they saw it in the newspapers
They didn’t recognise him when they saw his photo in the newspapers, for the same reason that nobody else did in Adelaide. The “reconstructed” photo of him wasn’t actually him.
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Perhaps just sending his fingerprints to English speaking countries only, was a mistake? Was a list composed as to which countries the fingerprints were sent to? The comment that he had a “British” face may have determined the list of countries? Also, his hair was combed straight back, no parting- a mite different to the photo released to the media.
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His fingerprints would need to be on record. How much time would they have, to waste searching through fingerprints, when they don’t even know if this guy has fingerprints on record. Probably a cursory look and that was it
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https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/fbi-digitizes-millions-of-files-in-modernization-push
Have the coppers asked the FBI to run the fingerprints through again, if the FBI have completed their conversion to digital for 1948 and before
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Coincidence? But, looking on the NAA site, at a Karl Thomsen, a photo of him holding a board with number ‘904’.
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Why would they need to send Somerton man’s fingerprints off when they already knew who he was. They wouldn’t. They knew his movements. Arrival into Sydney through Mascot airport, travel to Melbourne, wait to be instructed when to move to Adelaide. They knew who he was and so would the FBI and CIA
Running his fingerprints through again wouldn’t reveal anything, because they’re not Somerton man’s. They were too skilled to trip themselves up like that. It’s a pity we don’t have Boxall’s fingerprints to compare.
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The spoon is airline cutlery which had their logo stamped on the top of the handle as a visible reminder when using it as to who you were flying with. Although it has been partly blotted out to hide which airline it is, it looks like American Airlines, which flew US domestic flights to San Francisco. Pan Am flew San Francisco to Sydney. Somerton man slipped the spoon into his pocket.
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There are two air routes into San Francisco associated with American Airlines. Only one uses the American Airlines service
American Airlines DC-6. Nashville 11:30pm, Tulsa, Oklahoma City, San Francisco 6:50am
Pan Am DC-4. San Francisco, Honolulu, Canton Island, Suva, Noumea, Sydney
Nashville airport is the airport used for flights to the west coast from Oak Ridge and San Francisco is the airport used for flights to Sydney
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The fact that not one person from the Webb family, or Dorothy’s family, recognised the man in the photo is more proof, for me at least, that the snap is not of Carl Webb.
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