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Show Peculiar Belief or Acd f Inventor' Is Brought Out by Conner's ta- ' qutst Into His Death. ..- ;!'EW YORK, Febi 13. Joseph William Wil-liam Bhepard, an? Inventor and ' once . wealthy, starved himself to death In the belief that he could spiritualise his Ufa hd exist without eating; He died in jq apartment house at 'Ko. 159 West Eighty-third street and" Dr. Julian P. Thornas, a food specialist; who had koown him for several .years, told . the Coroner the aged mam may have Wen without food for several, months.. His only nourishment was a very little wine and occasionally a sip of honey, Dr. Thomas sent a communication to the Coroner's office about the case, stating ;hat death resulted from starvation. Sheyard was 64 years old, well educated edu-cated and a student of psychology. He had been engaged in glass manufacturing manufactur-ing until 10 years ago. when be retired from business, being able to live well on the royalties from bie patents. One of . kjs Inventions wag the. double glazed fire-proof windows, which are now used Jtn. nearly-all large, modern buildings. Some of hfs patents were still undevel-. undevel-. oped at the time of his death. Hla son, his physician and those who ! kper him say he was. not insane. .They declare his mind was perfectly clear and sound upon all other points. Drank No Water. JFor several years he ate nothing except ex-cept such fruits and vegetable as grew ' 1 the sun. Then be ceased drinking water and drank very sparingly of light wine. Gradually be cut down hla supply sup-ply of vegetables and took only very small quantities of rice. But even upon thte meager diet be seemed not to surfer sur-fer any physical inconvenience. He lived alone in hi apartment, never had meals served to Mm there, and bad not eaten a meal anywhere for a. year. 'rQn Ihe -last day of December he fell in the street and sprained his ankle so iat he was obliged to remain indoors from that time. So far as any one Knows,' his only sustenance since January Janu-ary 1st and for several months prior to that time bad been-a sip of wine and honey every .two or three days. In his room tonight was found" a small bottle of port wine nearly full. Mrs. Madden, who takes care xt the rooms in the house, said that to her private knowledge knowl-edge no food had passed bis lips in ten days, , Called by the Son. Dr. Thomaa had been called several i time by the son, but be could do nothing. noth-ing. Speaking of the strange case, Dr. Thomas said: "I have never heard of a parallel case. Mr. Shepard wu a man of intelligence and one of the moat -entertf inin talkers talk-ers I ever knew, provided one did not dipute him. Then -he -became . very aolent, in asserting the infallibility of s own views. ; About a year ago I , met hinvnd told him he certainly would die it he did not take food. He was greay displeased at that and said I did not understand. , " "By fasting I shall become more ethereal and shall so spiritualize myself that S will be able to know air the secrets se-crets of the universe, he told me. V"N.' 1 s1i to bim' 'you -wU1 dle He laughed at me. When I was called a week or ten days ago to see him he told me that he allowed me te come Just to pleaae his son and friends, but that be would do nothing I told him to do because I dtd not know what he knew. At that time there was nothing possible to be done except to force food into hla stomach, and had I done that I might have been held in part responsible respon-sible for his death." - |