And how--you may ask--did the cops get involved?
Well it seems for several years after daddy had been turned into a mummy, life went on at the family's home--with dad truly getting the King Tut treatment.
In the photo the body was laid out on the clean, crisp sheets of a bed upstairs--the head propped up on some fluffy white pillows. And Dad appeared to be wearing a fresh pair of p.j. That's right for several years dead old dead dad lay around bedridden as if he were merely nursing a bad cold.
In fact the family often left the t.v. at the foot of the bed running when they weren't at home just so dad would have something to keep him occupied.
And unfortunately it was during one of the times when all the family members were away that this unusual domestic arrangement finally came to an end. It seems on one such occasion someone forgot to tie up the family dog.
(Those of you with a sense of the macabre probably see where this is going).
Fido found father laying there in his nice clean jammies and went after him like a giant chew toy. The dog apparently had been gnawed on dad for only a short time when the family came home--much to their horror.
For some reason the family then decided to contact authorities after failing to do so for so long.
And when cops and social workers finally got a look inside the home, the decision was promptly made that for the safety and sanity of the children daddy needed to find a better final resting place than the master bedroom.

The part of the story I'll never forget--aside of course from that photo the cop showed me--was a description of the corpse in a police report. According to the document the mummified body was actually in very good shape--except of course to the portions that had been chewed on by the dog--and the fact that a colony of moths had taken up residence inside dad's skull. Wow, you really can't make that stuff up.

Chapter Two

But as weird as that story was I still don't think is was nearly as weird as the story of Billy Tipton, the cross-dressing jazz musician from Spokane Washington.
Billy was born a female but spent her entire adult life masquerading man. A secret sexual charade that must have been very effective. Indeed so successful was Billy's gender bending act that as a man Billy became a fairly well-known recording artist and band leader--a husband--even a father to three adopted sons.
In fact Billy's three boys didn't learn the truth about their "dad" until literally the day of Billy's death back in 1989 at the age of 74.
I flew to Spokane Washington and did a story for "A Current Affair" on Billy shortly after the death. I opened the story with the following lines:
"He was great on piano. He was tremendous on sax. Billy backed up Sinatra. He played with the Duke. Yet for all his many musical accomplishments Billy Tipton will probably best be remembered for his ability to act. Because you see Billy Tipton was actually a woman...a jazzy gender-bender who for nearly sixty years turned the entire world into a stage...while composing for herself a brand new life as Mr. Billy Tipton."
One of Billy's adopted sons...Billy Tipton Jr...was with his father when he died and he described to me the bizarre and rather poinant moment as follows"
"One of the paramedics turned to me and asked if my dad had had a sex change at any time in his life...and I became outraged at this...at first it was a...it was a great shock...I couldn't believe that this had happened. But it was only moments later that I told myself...I said 'Hey nothing 's changed...no matter what he was...I loved him just the way he was.'"....more later......mw