The Strange & Curious Tale of the Last True Hermit

Misfit

Lawful neutral
http://www.gq.com/news-politics/newsmakers/201409/the-last-true-hermit

His name, he revealed, was Christopher Thomas Knight. Born on December 7, 1965. He said he had no address, no vehicle, did not file a tax return, and did not receive mail. He said he lived in the woods.

"For how long?" wondered Perkins-Vance.


Knight thought for a bit, then asked when the Chernobyl nuclear-plant disaster occurred. He had long ago lost the habit of marking time in months or years; this was just a news event he happened to remember. The nuclear meltdown took place in 1986, the same year, Knight said, he went to live in the woods. He was 20 years old at the time, not long out of high school. He was now 47, a middle-aged man.

Knight stated that over all those years he slept only in a tent. He never lit a fire, for fear that smoke would give his camp away. He moved strictly at night. He said he didn't know if his parents were alive or dead. He'd not made one phone call or driven in a car or spent any money. He had never in his life sent an e-mail or even seen the Internet.

He confessed that he'd committed approximately forty robberies a year while in the woods—a total of more than a thousand break-ins. But never when anyone was home. He said he stole only food and kitchenware and propane tanks and reading material and a few other items. Knight admitted that everything he possessed in the world, he'd stolen, including the clothes he was wearing, right down to his underwear. The only exception was his eyeglasses.

Perkins-Vance called dispatch and learned that Knight had no criminal record. He said he grew up in a nearby community, and his senior picture was soon located in the 1984 Lawrence High School yearbook. He was wearing the same eyeglasses.

For close to three decades, Knight said, he had not seen a doctor or taken any medicine. He mentioned that he had never once been sick. You had to have contact with other humans, he claimed, in order to get sick.

When, said Perkins-Vance, was the last time he'd had contact with another person?

Sometime in the 1990s, answered Knight, he passed a hiker while walking in the woods.

"What did you say?" asked Perkins-Vance.

"I said, 'Hi,' " Knight replied. Other than that single syllable, he insisted, he had not spoken with or touched another human being, until this night, for twenty-seven years.
 

RPMDAD

Well-Known Member
Interesting article, i just don't know how he could have survived for so many winters up there in a tent, when he said he never lit a fire. Been there and done that it is damn cold in Maine in the winter. Have done winter camping up in N.E. in the snow and ice, and it is damn cold even with a fire. I do respect the fact he only stole the stuff he needed to survive. pretty amazing story. I did learn, take your boots off and put them in yoursleeping bag after the first time camping and i didn't and they froze solid, had to warm them up by the fire before i could even put them on. PS it is very cold on your tootsies while in you socks walking across a snow base to thaw your boots by the fire.
 
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Interesting article, i just don't know how he could have survived for so many winters up there in a tent, when he said he never lit a fire. Been there and done that it is damn cold in Maine in the winter. Have done winter camping up in N.E. in the snow and ice, and it is damn cold even with a fire. I do respect the fact he only stole the stuff he needed to survive. pretty amazing story. I did learn, take your boots off and put them in yoursleeping bag after the first time camping and i didn't and they froze solid, had to warm them up by the fire before i could even put them on. PS it is very cold on your tootsies while in you socks walking across a snow base to thaw your boots by the fire.

It did say he stole propane. Maybe he used a stove or had a small heater.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
I met a guy on the Appalachian trail just north of Harpers Ferry. He claims he 'lives' on the trail for 8 months out of the year. He hikes between Connecticut & Virginia. The other 4 months he's live on board security. He stays in a boat in a marina in Virginia. He says all he has to pay for are the utilities. He guesses that he has hiked around 5,000 miles. He's in his mid 60s and appears to be in good shape.
 
So... if no one knew he was out there, and was only found recently, how do we know he's the last one? Won't ever know if they choose not to be found.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
I finally read the entire article. It was well written. Great insight into what a person that would just move off the grid was thinking. There aren't a whole lot of places on the east coast where you can be totally isolated and still have access to items that you would need to survive.

It's a good read and I recommend it to anyone that has any interest in human dynamics.
 

Misfit

Lawful neutral
Lessons of the Hermit

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/lessons-of-the-hermit/517770/?utm_source=atlfb

After seven months in custody, Knight is granted some measure of leniency. He moves home with his mother and is hired by his brother to disassemble cars for his scrap-metal business. He ignores Finkel’s requests for additional interviews, but Finkel persists, showing up at his mother’s house. Nobody seems to be home. Finkel waits outside. Knight emerges from the bushes.

He is depressed, disoriented, lonely. He speaks of a visitation from the Lady of the Woods, a sylvan figure of death. Death seems better than enforced socialization. Even human faces, with all the information they convey, overwhelm him. “I miss the woods,” he says, before urging Finkel never to contact him again.

Finkel is moved to tears at the sight of Knight, broken and trapped, exiled from his forest home. The hermit of North Pond feels this tragedy more acutely than most, but he is not alone. “He has known something far more profound,” writes Finkel, “and that sense of loss feels unbearable.” We have known something far more profound, and that sense of loss feels unbearable.
 

Monello

Smarter than the average bear
PREMO Member
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