A
teenage runaway was finally buried recently, but not before his mummified
body had become a local fixture in the backroom of a local funeral parlor
for the past 80 years.
The specific details of his
death are not known. Because his body was found near the railroad tracks
in Calvert, Texas, it was assumed that he fell or was pushed from a
passing train. Before authorities were able to discover that the body was
a fifteen-year-old runaway, the local funeral director embalmed him and
placed him in a pine coffin. For some reason, the mortician did not seal
the coffin; instead, he covered it with a wire screen.
When the boy's family was
finally contacted, they were told that they owed the funeral director $108
for his services. The family was quite poor and stunned by the bill.
According to a local newspaper reporter, they told the director,
"Well, for $108, you can keep him."
For the next 80 years, the
boy's body was kept in a back room. No one knows exactly why the boy's
body did not decay (after all, embalming is said to be a temporary
preservation process), but if the fluids were well-drained from the body
and air circulated around the body (because of the screen cover), natural
mummification could have occurred.
Every so often, the back
room was the site for poker and domino games. Since the mummified boy
looked as if he was smiling, many of the gamblers thought that he brought
them good luck. They called the boy "Mojo," meaning good luck,
and he became the small town's unofficial mascot.
Although the funeral parlor
was sold a number of times over the 80 years, Mojo stayed in the back
room, until the most recent owner decided to lay the body to rest.
Approximately 60 people attended Mojo's funeral.
