THE RARELY ASKED BUT BURNING QUESTION
A refurbished British Ericcson wall phone, MW 235. From 1930 to 1945 the PMG rebuilt these from old stocks of candlestick phones.
The whole case, and I do mean the entire case regarding the connection between Jestyn and the Somerton Man rests on one thing and one thing only as far as we are aware. The telephone number written in 'really tiny lettering' (according to Detective Brown) on the back of the Rubaiyat, X 3239. How did the Police know that this was Jestyn's number?
You could say that we have proof of that number being used by Prosper in a number of newspaper ads:
But, the consensus at the time was that SM arrived in Adelaide on a train from Melbourne, so what about this ad in a Melbourne newspaper, The Argus 23rd February 1946:
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| You could argue that the number is either 3239 or 2239, a bit blurred. |
In this case, the person who placed this ad was looking to exchange their current, beachside, home for another in Kew.
For the record, the X prefix indicates that this was a location in or near St. Kilda/Brighton. Here's a link to an old Telephony text PDF, it provides information on exchange setups and prefix planning, for those interested look at page 30 in the pdf. It is a very useful reference for any researcher.
Is the number 2239 or 3239? Whichever it is for this ad, I think it reasonable to assume that there was more than likely a phone number X3239 in St Kilda/Brighton at that time.
It is a critical question as I feel sure most would agree but it's not that simple to resolve. The Melbourne telephone directory does exist, I think the year is 1947, but it is on microfiche in alphabetical order and the only way you are able to search it is if you have the name of the subscriber.
For the record, Clive has already made inquiries re the K J Widmer St Kilda ( Tibor Kaldor Referee) connection without success. That doesn't mean it wasn't a number KJW had access to though.
We are left with only one option in the absence of that name and that is to go to the Victorian Library and physically search the microfiche for that number.
Clive recalls a comment made on the Smithsonian blog some years ago where someone suggested that they had done that but they didn't leave the name but suggested that the number was to be found in the second half of the directory.
There are paid researchers available in Melbourne and I guess the staff at the library would be happy to provide a list. I would go if I could but that's not possible at this time and the cost of flights and accommodation would likely be more than hiring a good researcher for the task.
I would be happy to chip in if someone wants to get it organised, it should be understood that there is no guarantee that the St.Kilda/Brighton number will yield a positive lead but it certainly needs to be followed through and for the life of me I can't understand why it hasn't happened. Unless of course it has been done already?
What do you say Pete Bowes?
Hi Gordon, "Argus" 6-10-45 P24 & 15/12/45 P23 & 7/8/46 P20-Adverts for cream pram in Brighton area tel X3239. "Argus" 3/3/45 P20 Watch for sale, Gent's pocket Omega, perfect cond. X2239, 14/2/46 P16 & 16/2/46 P24 & 20/2/46 P16-Exchange gff Brighton for similar hse at Kew. Either the "Argus" got these tel. numbers wrong or, both numbers X2239 & X3239 were in the same area? Clive
ReplyDeleteHe says it looks more like a 2
ReplyDeleteI take it back, the good wife says it's a 3 .....
ReplyDeleteJS, thanks for the offer. There are a couple of things that are of real interest.
ReplyDeleteFirst one relates to this post, we know that the book had the number X3239 written on the back and the Police stated that it was Jestyn's number. However, we also know that the same number existed in ST.Kilda and or Brighton in Victoria, it also existed in Brisbane and it existed in Canberra. So, given that it was thought that our man arrived on the overnight train from Melbourne, how were the Police so certain that the number was indeed, Jestyn's?
K J Widmer and Helen A.R. Ross, Tibor's other two referees pose other questions, we have linked Elizabeth Bethune Stainforth to the Victoria league and in turn we have linked the secretarial telephone number, Windsor 5883, for the league to the Address 10 The Avenue, Windsor and Miss C Brown. We are not certain about the circumstances of how these two people knew Tibor, we know that KJW knew him for 2 years as per his certificate and HR knew him for 5 years. Were they also members of the Victoria League or was it some other association?
Of these questions, that of the telephone number, X3239, is the most perplexing. Just how did the Police arrive at the conclusion that this was Jestyn's number and not one of the others mentioned?
Is it possible that the users of X3239 number, outside of SA, were checked by the police and discounted. That, with the body being found so near to the SA location of X3239 the police put 2 and 2 together and were pretty certain Jessie wan involved? Perhaps the most obvious, possible reason is her initials were on the back of the book? Clve
ReplyDeleteHi Clive, That could be the case, you would think that they would have made mention of initials being found though? I have feeling that there is a big slice of information that was withheld for some reason.
DeleteJS, thanks for your information, it would be good to know the names of the publications you refer to.
ReplyDeleteJust a thought....
ReplyDeleteWhere did X3239 come from? That is, why do we believe X3239 is the number that was in the Rubaiyat? Who has actually seen it? Is it perhaps possible that someone more recently, knowing that there was a number there, and knowing that it was linked to Jestyn reverse-engineered it (via Prosper's ads and/or a phone book) and since then we've all just taken for granted that X3239 is the number in question?
Is it perhaps possible that the phone number on the Rubaiyat was to her work rather than her home (which is why Police were so confident it was hers, not Prosper's?).
I'm not saying X3239 ISN'T the number, but how sure are we that it is?
I would be certain that this was the Thomson's number and that it is highly likely that this number was found on the back of the Rubaiyat, however, it is still not certain that the number found was a South Australian number, it could have been from Brisbane, Canberra or Melbourne. There is no record of any efforts made to confirm its origin.
DeleteThe phone number can be seen in the original newspaper photo of the back of the book - it was intentionally obscured in subsequent photos: https://randomfh.blogspot.com/2018/10/finding-jestyns-phone-number-rubaiyat.html
DeleteAnon: some anonymous police sources in GF's book, not many, were described as reliable .... others who contributed then can be thought to be unreliable. How would you read Detective Brown?
ReplyDeleteCouldn't find 3239 in the (digital version of) GF's book - which is hardly surprising, given it was anonimized (it's where 'Theresa Powell' comes from).
DeleteEveryone refers to X3239 confidently being the number, but I'm not finding why people think it's so, and wondered whether it's possible that it's been reverse engineered. ie:
1) We know the number was linked to Jestyn
2) The number at 90A was X3239
3) The number must have been X3239
IF this is the case, it's possible that it's not actually the correct number. That's why I'm interested what the most reliable source is that X3239 was the actual number.
We only have Det Brown's statement that clearly states it was the number, when you put that together with the newspaper ads showing that same number and the name Thompson, then it's a lay down misere. I take on your comment regarding which came first, the ads or the finding of the number on the code page. For the moment at least, we should stick to the number being first discovered on the back of the book. But, as pointed out, that would not be sufficient to suspect Jestyn's involvement, just a number which happens to have been written on the back of the book which was later traced to the body of the Somerton Man?
ReplyDeleteAdelaide Telephone Book (1949) shows entry (in bold): Sister J.E. Thomson, 90a Moseley St, Glenelg X3239. Clive
ReplyDeleteJS, regarding the information and statements made by various officers involved in the case. I respectfully suggest that you consider that within the ranks of the service it was always known that you don't leak information of any kind and if you are pressed then you might take some of the basics and give them a good coat of grey and murky before delivering them. It really was a question of sticking to the rules from their perspective and not an example of shoddy work. Sure they would have made mistakes, none of us is infallible, but they also id some great work on this and other cases. Don't judge these men too harshly and don't judge them at all if you haven't been there and done that under the conditions they were facing. I believe that there may well have been other influences at play and that the finding of the body on the beach had far reaching consequences even across 70 years. Just maybe we are all a step closer to finding out just what those consequences were.
ReplyDeleteJS, I read your comment re the letter Q and thanks for the acknowledgement I am truly glad that you got to see the examples at first hand, we can now make a great deal more progress. I will be posting in the next day or so with some further thoughts that may be of use, as you would imagine I have a fair bit of information on this topic and am more than happy to share it. Thanks again.
ReplyDeleteJohn Sanders. Re your comment about Mr. Francis and Jetty Road Glenelg not being wide enough to park cars alongside the trams, http://www.photographicartgallery.com.au/historic-photos/historic-old. You'll see a newish pic but the road hasn't been widened.Lots of space to park cars, and there always has been to my knowledge.
ReplyDelete