Seattle Times Readers ID Globetrotting Amnesiac

Three weeks ago, a well-dressed man carrying $600 in his sock wandered out of a Seattle park with no idea who he was or how he got there. His identity was a mystery until today, when the Seattle Times ran a story on its front page with his picture and the headline, “Who is this man?” Within hours, readers of the Times’ web edition from across the nation and the globe had identified him.

The man is Edward Lighthart, say former colleagues and classmates in China and Ohio, who emailed pictures of him to the Times. “The name isn't ringing a bell, but the image is definitely me,” he says. Of course, the name doesn’t clear up all the questions surrounding the globetrotting intellectual, who is fluent in English, French, and German. According to his new bio, he skipped off to Austria after graduating college in Wisconsin, once worked as a chef in New York, and entered the country last year from Canada.
(More Edward Lighthart stories.)