72-year-old Sue Powers managed an apartment building located at 232 Lime Avenue in Long Beach, California. She would get the surprise of her life when one of her tenants, a man named Clint Bolin, decided to move out. She was uncertain of the exact date, but it was sometime between April 16 and April 19, 1975.  

Sue told the Los Angeles Times, “He was friendly, but quiet, and always paid his rent promptly with $50 and $100 bills. On April 16th, he asked if he had until midnight to pay his rent. I said yes, but when he didn’t come back, we checked his apartment on April 19.”

Here’s what they found:

“Everything was filled with boxes of rocks. Only a narrow trail led to the couch where he must have slept, and to the toilet.

“The closets, the kitchen, the bathtub, everything was filled. But nobody ever saw him carrying them in. And I can’t imagine how he was strong enough to carry those boxes. “

Clint’s age was never mentioned in the article, but Sue did describe him as standing around 5′ 10 inches (178 cm) tall and weighing around 150 pounds (68 kg).

Roughly, Clint left behind 600 boxes of rocks with an estimated total weight of 60,000 lb. or 27,220 kg.

Interestingly, after he moved out of Sue’s apartment, Clint spent a few nights at two area motels. And once again, he left behind several hundred pounds of rock.

So, was any of this worth anything? Not really. It was just box upon box of rocks and slabs of cement and concrete.

As you can imagine, removing all these rocks from that apartment was no easy task. But Sue did find someone who was willing to help.

“Tuesday, a nice young man who only said his name was Tom came by and offered to help. He said he was a weightlifter and worked out at the Y, so he didn’t mind the work.”