Part 2:
If he had drugs or anything else in his system to explain how he could do what he did, his autopsy didn't detect them. The assumption was that he'd suffered a mental breakdown of some kind.
Despite exhaustive efforts, he was never identified; no next of kin was ever found. He died a John Doe. And he's remained one for 26 years.
"It's as if he was beamed here from a spaceship," Sgt. Mike Grimes told a reporter at the time.
Grimes, now retired and living in Florida, was head of APD's homicide unit in those days. Although this was a suicide, he assigned the case to one of his investigators.
"He really took it to heart," Grimes said of Bill Morris, who carried that file around with him for months. "I mean, he searched everywhere."
The use of DNA in forensic science was in its infancy in those days, and none was taken from the man's body. Instead, Morris sent his description-white male, early 30s, 185 pounds, between 6 and 6-foot-3-and his fingerprints and dental records to the FBI and missing person clearinghouses in all 50 states and Canada. He visited mental health facilities and showed his autopsy photo around.
"We never got a hit," Grimes said. "It was just bugging the hell out of all of us. Who is this guy? What is his story?"
The only thing left to think was that he was a foreign national, Grimes said. Possibly Polish. Since the early '80s, Polish fishermen had been jumping ship right and left in Seward, seeking political asylum from their country's Communist regime.
Morris even ran the case by Interpol, an international law enforcement organization based in France.
Nothing.
And so on a cold and windy September day, the man was buried in a simple wooden coffin covered in gray felt at Anchorage Memorial Park Cemetery, a man with no name and no history laid to rest among some of Alaska's most storied leaders and pioneers. Besides the press and various officials, four strangers showed up, including two mental health consumer advocates, people who couldn't bear the thought of a man with no name going to his grave with no one to mourn him.
"To this nameless one we say, God be with you and keep you," funeral director Fred Witzleben said before the casket was lowered into the ground.
"John Doe 1989-1989," the grave marker reads at Track 13, Space 24.
This story has since been woven into APD history, handed down from seasoned cops to newcomers and rookies.
"I know it's kind of bad but we referred to this case as The Flagpole Jumper," said Cynthia Bradley, a former APD detective.
Among other duties, Bradley worked on missing person cases, which is why the call that came in a few years back was directed to her. That's when The Flagpole Jumper case became a lot more personal.
The call was from a California woman who is certain the man lying in that grave is her brother. So certain, she's having his body exhumed for DNA testing this month in hopes of giving him back his name, and his dignity, and finally bringing him home.
His sister's protector
If Terry Mihok is right, the man who died that day in Mountain View is Gordon Bethel Lopez, a Reed College student who vanished from Portland, Oregon in 1986. On purpose.
It's not easy for her to talk about what became of her brother. She loved him and never stopped looking for him, searching crowds for his face, the streets for his red Volvo sedan. And she never gave up hope that he would come home someday.
They grew up in the Los Angeles area, a family of six until their father lost a drawn-out battle with cancer, one that left him paralyzed from the neck down toward the end. Gordon not only made sure Terry didn't forget how to laugh during those grim times, he became her protector.
"He was kind of put in charge of looking after me because my dad died when I was six (Gordon was 10) and my mom worked as a schoolteacher," Terry said. "So I hung out with Gordon a lot, with him and his friends.
"He was a wrestler in high school and a track star, as well We used to play football on the street, and he was usually the quarterback. We'd play street pick-up games, and when I'd play and he would give the ball to me, nobody would tackle me because he was my brother and he was bigger than everyone at that time. So that was fun for me."
As Terry speaks of him, a picture emerges of a young man, "brilliant at math," who was enough of an academic heavyweight to make it into Reed College, a man who cared deeply about things, a man who loved to read, from the classics to science fiction. One of his favorite authors was Hermann Hess, the German-born Swiss poet and novelist whose books explore the search for authenticity, self-knowledge and spirituality.
"I actually lived with him in Portland while he was going to college, for a brief time," Terry said. "My mother kicked me out of the house when I was 16, so I went to live with Gordon for a while.
"He was living in not the best conditions. He had a basement room in a house and it was very dark and damp and there was mold growing on the wall. That's probably not best place for someone growing up in Southern California to be living.
"I didn't realize he was depressed."
Without a trace
Terry and Gordon wrote letters to each other while he was away at college or working summer jobs out of state. He was in his third year at Reed when he called to thank her for the Christmas gifts she'd sent him, a flannel shirt and giant bag of M&Ms, his favorite.
"I was the last person to talk to him," she said. "He called me and I didn't know anything was wrong."
Soon after, he sent a letter addressed to their mother.
"My mom was in Japan with my sister; she lived there at the time," Terry said. "So I opened it and found the note that he left. He wrote that she would never see him again and that he had no regrets for the past."
Along with his farewell note, Gordon returned his college tuition check.
"I don't really know what happened between them; I can imagine," Terry said. "All of us kids had a lot of issues with her. And she drank a lot when we were young. So we had a lot to deal with."
Gordon was last seen on Jan. 3, 1986.
"His car was never found as far as I know. It was never found and it was never registered again. And he completely cleaned out his apartment. There was nothing left.
"My mom did hire a private investigator but he never found anything, nothing at all. Everything was just gone. Everything.
"So, he disappeared. He didn't leave any trace."