“He kept to himself but always sent a real nice Christmas card every year. He even took the time to make his own drawings all over the card and envelope. They looked like them Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Real interesting.” Sweeny recounted.

Quietly and with very little ostentation, Beaterman amassed a fortune farming one of the most humble, some might even say loathsome of creatures: the leech. Thought of as an anachronism, medical leeches have been in use since colonial times to treat various ailments. Modern medicine still uses these cringe inducing invertebrates in everything from minor surgeries to varicose vein treatments.

When Dr. Braunheimer Vondieberge began The Albuquerque Reconstructive Surgery and Southwest Pet Food Consortium in the 1990s, he had a hard time tracking down a steady supply of leeches for his practice.

“It wasn’t like we used to pay local kids $5 to, uh, go catch leeches from fishing ponds or anything” Dr. Vondieberge added nervously while avoiding eye contact.

Vondieberge’s practice in Arizona wasn’t the only one to find their way to Beaterman’s Appalachian facility. Even without an internet presence or national marketing campaign, doctors from around the country somehow connected with the West Virginia native. And over time Beaterman seemed to amass resources from his efforts.

Sometime in the late 80s he donated land and money to the First Swedenborgian Theosophical Full Gospel Church of Mingo County, a baffling religious group that met at seemingly random days and times. Folks who drove by the neat one room building would remark that it would be dark and empty for months on end only to hold services for three nights in a row at various inconvenient times. According to local county records, Beaterman appears to be the only benefactor of the congregation.

In addition to entrepreneur and philanthropist, William J. Beaterman was also a prolific writer. Found both among the ashes and ruins of various buildings on his property were hermetically sealed, fireproof trunks full of papers. Local firefighters were the first to happen upon these caches of writings.

Firefighters recount what they saw in these metal safe boxes:

“The top paper in both the boxes I seen had some kind of last will and testament. It was signed by Norma’s grandma in town and everything.” Reported Clayton “Earl” Smithens, local volunteer firefighter who removed the boxes from what was left of the shed.

‘Norma’s grandma’ presumably being Jeanie Williams, grandmother of Norma Williams. The Williams family has served county residents for generations as Notary Publics. The elder Ms. Williams had passed away in 1942.

‘Norma’s grandma’ presumably being Jeanie Williams, grandmother of Norma Williams. The Williams family has served county residents for generations as Notary Publics. The elder Ms. Williams had passed away in 1942.

“All I could really make out on [the last will and testament] was that ol’ Willy really wanted somebody to do something with his writings.. If I read the red inked vellum correctly, it said they [Beaterman’s papers] needed to be published and recorded and that the descendent who did so to the widest confirmed audience would get the largest part of his estate.” Smithens continued.

Other witnesses on the scene say that the boxes were full of poems, random words and indecipherable doodles. But first responders and county investigators did not have much time to make sense of the content of Beaterman’s papers. Within hours church congregants and distant family descended on the Beaterman property apparently searching only for these literary vaults. Within an hour and without much discussion about a dozen of these vaults were deftly loaded into vehicles and driven away even before the ‘laboratory’ had finished smoldering.

“The family swooped in like a swarm of locusts and grabbed the boxes making an audible count as they loaded them in the various and sundry vehicles. It was something else.” According to Smithens.

But the contents of those hermetically sealed metal boxes may not remain secret forever. Early next year indie label Mingo Records is releasing the album Too Young for a Legacy: The Beaterman Files Vol.1. The album is suspected to be the production of Mr. Beaterman’s seemingly endless cousins, nieces and nephews but is being released under the abbreviated name of the departed that he often used to sign his various writings: Beat., Willy

Advance word states that the album contains 12 songs whose lyrical content covers everything from heartbreak, a history of the Western Church, trepanning, Ayn Rand’s Welfare checks and a critique of the 20^th century analytic tradition set to an Afro-pop beat.

Look for a single to be released around New Year's Day 2021. The full album will be available on all major music platforms sometime in early 2021

Authorities have set up a temporary hotline for any additional information concerning the whereabouts of Clayton “Earl” Smithens or Phillippe Rosencrantz.