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PART ONE: What happened to Dallas? by Ben Tipton, Cameron O'Neill and Jess Lipowski
Nothing was ever usual for James Dallas Egbert III. He had an IQ of 180, was called upon to fix computers at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base at the age of 12 and was admitted to Michigan State University at the age of 14. He was also a scrawny five feet five inches tall, weighing 130 pounds. Moreover he was a homosexual, a member of the Gay Council on campus, at a time when many people still didn't discuss homosexuality in polite company. Dallas found it hard to make friends, to fit in. He did find some young people with whom he could play the fantasy game Dungeons and Dragons (D&D). He also turned drugs for relaxation and escape. He was able to make his own PCP and even managed to extract nicotine from cigarettes. Going to extremes to be noticed by his peers, Dallas even trestled while under the influence of drugs -- trestling is when you lie down between the train tracks and wait for a train to roll over you.
On August 15, 1979, Dallas walked out of the cafeteria in Case Hall during summer school and vanished. Much to his parents' distress, they weren't told of his disappearance until a week later, according to a book on the mystery called The Dungeon Master, written by private investigator William Dear. Dallas' parents hired famed private investigator Dear to find their son. He writes that he and his team of investigators made predictions about what they thought had happened to Dallas. Did he run away? Had he committed suicide? Was his disappearance related to drugs or to the role-playing game D&D? Had he been harmed by someone else? When Dear and his team searched Dallas' room, he wrote that one of the most striking things about the room was its orderly appearance. Two things stood out: a corkboard with pegs that might be a map and a note on Dallas’ desk that read: “To whom it may concern: should my body be found, I wish it to be cremated.” Other poems also seemed to suggest suicide. The more Dear talked with Dallas' parents, the more concerned he became that the young man felt pressure from many directions. Dallas' mother told Dear that her son once told her he had received a 3.5 in a class. She then reportedly told her son there was no reason for him not to earn a 4.0. Dallas' disappearance soon snowballed into one of MSU’s most (in)famous manhunts. The most popular theory about the corkboard was that it was a map of the steam tunnels that honeycomb the MSU campus. People speculated that Dallas and his D&D friends may have decided to live out the scenarios from the role-playing game in real life in the tunnels. There are almost nine miles of tunnels that bring heat to almost every building on campus. A three-day search of the tunnels turned up lots of beer bottles and a few tables, but no sign of Dallas. News accounts of the case demonized D&D as yet another in a long list of dangerous fads luring kids to their doom. PART TWO NEXT WEEK: Find out what happened to Dallas and about the kinds of help available to students on campus today. |
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