A TIcking Clock That May Have Stopped....

Why the Somerton Man’s Timeline May Be a Mechanical Illusion

Ticket G 52703 found on the Somerton Man. Note the texture of the "30 NOV 1948" stamp compared to the pre-printed serial number.

One of the anchors in the Somerton Man case timeline was the 'Left Luggage' ticket, it was attached to.

A Brown Suitcase that was checked into the Adelaide Railway Station Cloakroom supposedly at 11:00 AM on November 30, 1948.

This date and timestamped ticket is the foundation of every theory associated with the man's possessions and his 'persona'. It provide us with information about which train he could have arrived on (the 10:50 AM from Broken Hill? The earlier overnight from Melbourne?). It's the foundation of the 'legend' of the Somerton Man.

But what if the "11:00 AM" date stamp fact isn't a fact at all? What if it's a mechanical illusion?

New forensic analysis of the evidence, specifically the physical characteristics of Ticket G 52703, suggests that the timeline relies on a vulnerable, vintage system that may have been manually manipulated at the exact moment the suitcase was supposedly dropped off.

This post is not asserting a new truth; we are asking if the old truth holds up to forensic, mechanical scrutiny.

The Split-System Anomaly: Rubber vs. Steel

Many researchers assumed the ticket was printed by a single secure machine. However, a close, forensic review of the ticket image reveals a "Split-System" of authentication.

The front of the ticket—the only side we have a clear image of—displays the date "30 NOV 1948." This mark bears the characteristic "squash" and "halo" of a hand-held rubber stamp. Unlike the heavy "Dating Press" used for train tickets, which physically crushed the paper with metal dies, the ink on the suitcase ticket sits unevenly on the surface.

If the date was applied by a simple desk stamp, the integrity of the timeline rests entirely on the time stamp reported to be on the back.

The Invisible Machine

Critically, no photograph of the reverse side of Ticket G 52703 exists in the public domain. We are relying entirely on the 1949 inquest testimony that a "clock stamp" was present.

Based on railway procurement in 1948, the machine used was likely a Gledhill-Brook or International Time Recorder (ITR). Unlike the front stamp, these machines used a fabric ribbon to print the time gently. This explains why there is no heavy pressure mark visible on the front.

But these machines had a flaw: The Ribbon Drag. If the ribbon was dry or the mechanism jammed, the operator had to open the case. Once the case was open, the clock face could be manually adjusted—just like setting a wristwatch.

Video: A restoration of a Gledhill-Brook Time Recorder. Note the internal clockwork mechanism that requires manual winding and setting.

Inner Mechanism of  Gledhill Brook Time Stamp Machine

The "Coal Strike" Variable: A Broken Clock?

The most innocent explanation for an incorrect timestamp is not a conspiracy—it is the infrastructure.

November 1948 was the height of the National Coal Strike. Power rationing and "load shedding" (rolling brownouts) were common across South Australian industry.

If the Adelaide Railway Station lost power at 10:00 AM, the electric drive on the cloakroom clock would stop. When power returned, the clerk (R. Craig) would have to manually wind the hands forward to reset it. Without a verified reference, he could easily have set the clock to "11:00 AM" when it was actually 9:00 AM, or vice versa. If the machine was dead, the "11:00 AM" timestamp could be nothing more than a guess by a busy railway clerk. Mr.R Craig, the employee it is said issued the ticket, was on leave at the time of the Inquest, another person, Mr. Harold Rolfe North, Senior Porter, spoke for him. A Police statement was not taken from Mr R.Craig according to publicly available records.

The Missing Ledger: The Cash Book Void

Even if the clock machine did not have an internal counter, the station’s accounting system did. Railway clerks in 1948 would have been required to balance their cash against ticket numbers at the end of every shift. This was recorded in a "Coaching Traffic Return" or "Daily Sales Book." I am still trying to trace a copy of that cash book.

If Ticket G 52703 was genuinely sold on November 30, it would be listed in this book alongside the tickets sold immediately before and after it and the cash payment.

Yet, there is no record in the inquest files of the Police seizing this specific ledger. They seized the ticket and suitcase, but apparently not the proof of purchase.

The "Time-Travel" Ticket: Was it pulled on January 14?

This absence of audit creates a massive window of opportunity. The falsification did not necessarily happen on the day Detective Leane arrived (January 14, 1949). The suitcase sat "unclaimed" in the station for 45 days.

Anytime between December 1, 1948, and January 14, 1949, a ticket could have been pulled from a spare roll, backdated using the rubber stamp, and associated with the suitcase.

This creates a mathematical trap. If the station processed say, just 50 pieces a day, over 2,000 tickets would have been issued between November 30 and January 14.

• If G 52703 is a legitimate November 30th 1948 number, the sequence holds.

• But if G 52703 turns out to be a number from the January sequence, then the "11:00 AM Nov 30" timestamp is 'questionable'.

The Challenge

So, we are left with a ticket that bears the signs of a rubber date stamp, and potentially a handwritten or manually reset time, and a serial number that has never been audited against its neighbors. Until we find Ticket G 52702 or G 52704, the "11:00 AM" timeline and the date stamp remain an assumption, not a substantiated fact.

CITATIONS
Historical records confirm that on November 30, 1948, Adelaide was in the grip of a power crisis. The Advertiser (Nov 30, p.2) reported on the urgent need for industrial power stability, and rolling blackouts were a common counter-measure during the ongoing coal shortage.

Citation 1: The Ongoing Crisis (Mid-November)

• Headline: "Coal Strike Effects"

• Source: The Advertiser (Adelaide), November 16, 1948, Page 1.

• Fact: The article confirms that coal stocks were critically low and that industrial power restrictions were being debated/implemented across the state to conserve fuel.

Citation 2: The Critical Date (Nov 30)

• Headline: "POWER FOR INDUSTRY"

• Source: The Advertiser (Adelaide), November 30, 1948, Page 2.

• Fact: On the very day the Somerton Man supposed;y arrived, the main editorial was discussing the urgent need for power reliability for industry, reflecting the instability of the grid at that precise moment.

Citation 3: The "Load Shedding" Context

• Headline: "Power Cuts In Suburbs" (General Context for late 1948)

• Source: The News (Adelaide), November 1948 (Various dates).

• Fact: Reports of "blackouts" or "cuts" were common in the suburbs and industrial sectors during this period due to the coal shortage in New South Wales (which supplied SA).

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The Tamam Shud blog is dedicated to uncovering the forensic realities of the Somerton Man case. Our mission is not to speculate, but to reconstruct the events of 1948 using primary documents, scientific modelling, and expert analysis. While the man's true identity may remain a mystery, our focus is on the evidence that reveals how he died and the networks involved. To ensure the integrity of this research, we rely solely on verifiable sources and citations, strictly excluding anonymous blog comments and forum speculation from our data.