Today, the 28th of March 2015, the subscribers of the Mediber mailing-list received a sad annoucement: Joseph Thomas Snow had died. The commotion lasted only about twenty minutes, until Joseph Snow himself replied to the mailing-list stating, with a great sense of humour, that the rumours of his death had been greatly exaggerated.
Where did the news come from then? Apparently, an obituary for another Joseph Snow –this one Joseph A. Snow– appeared on the 5th of March 2015 in The Augusta Chronicle and assumptions were made too hastily; “our” Joseph Snow being such an important figure in the celestinesque community.
What I find more disturbing about this anecdote is that, while searching for the obituary source of this misunderstanding, I discovered that a man also named Joseph Thomas Snow, and also addressed to as “Joe”, died in 2011, so that if you enter “Joseph T. Snow” + “obituary” in Google –Google’s personalised search notwithstanding– the very first result is precisely the 2011 obituary of “the other” Joseph T. Snow. The world is full of coincidences.