RHINELANDER, WI (WTAQ-WRN) — The body of a man found in northern Wisconsin over 40 years ago has been identified.
The man’s body was found in March 1980 in a field in the Town of Pine Lake near Rhinelander. An autopsy determined that the man died from hypothermia.
After decades of encountering several negative identity matches from numerous agencies, the Oneida County Medical Examiner’s Office exhumed the man’s body in 2021.
The Fond du Lac Medical Examiner’s Office then processed the man’s body for DNA collection, which eventually led students at the Investigative Genetic Genealogy Program at Ramapo College in New Jersey to confirm the man’s identity as Norman Grasser of Chicago.
Grasser was 31 years old at the time he was reported missing in January of 1980.
