Mortimer, a skeleton whose bones are believed to date back at least a century, is displayed in the The Restaurant on Grumbles Alley in Selma, Ala.
(AP Photo/Montgomery Advertiser, Julie Bennett)SELMA, Ala. – For decades, people have been piecing together the legend of Mortimer, a 7-foot-tall human skeleton on display in a Selma restaurant. Now, it appears Mortimer himself was actually pieced together.
Long believed to the remains of an unusually tall man, Mortimer has sat on a wooden barrel for years and served as resident conversation piece for the Restaurant on Grumbles Alley. His larger-than-life legacy took a hit last week when it was discovered that Mortimer was more than a foot shorter than long believed.
The stories about Mortimer vary, with one version claiming him to be a Native American and another pinning him down as a Confederate officer who fled the area instead of sticking around to fight off Union soldiers. Several of the legends have a farmer digging up Mortimer on his property and then turning him over to a physician as payment for an outstanding medical bill.
It appears now that not only did Mortimer spend a stint as a medical specimen in a physician’s office, but that he might actually have been created in that setting, a la Frankenstein’d monster The belief now is that Mortimer is an antique medical skeleton, meaning he is likely a composite of different people’s remains.
“We’re all going to be a little disappointed because he was a legend. But it is what it is,” said Dianne Smitherman, who owns the restaurant. “People are going to have their rumors [about him]. That’s fine. He’s still a legend around here.”