For 38 years, he was just bones in a field — a nameless man whose skeletal remains were found half a mile east of Correctionville, Iowa, off Highway 20, discovered by an Iowa Department of Transportation worker on August 30, 1988. Now investigators say they finally know who he was: Clarence Ames, a Dubuque native born on January 27, 1909, who would have been over 60 years old when he died.
According to KSCJ 1360, the remains were originally thought to belong to a white male estimated to be between 30 and 60 years old, and with no matching missing-person cases, the case went cold. Investigators later determined that Ames would have been well past 60 at the time of his death, a detail that helped distinguish him from earlier assumptions about the body found along the highway. As reported by WHO 13, the case went cold for decades after investigators were initially unsuccessful in putting a name to the remains.
The Woodbury County Sheriff's Office took up the case again in 2025, the station notes, pulling together old reports, prior test results and newer forensic technology in hopes of finally cracking it. Captain Don Armstrong started working the case in early 2025, and Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation Special Agent Lynn Olesen joined him on the effort, per the same report.
DNA Breakthrough Points to a Texas Family Tree
In 2025, the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, working with the Iowa Office of the State Medical Examiner, submitted the skeletal remains to Othram for advanced DNA testing, according to DNA Solves. The lab developed a forensic-grade genome sequencing profile from the extract, after which the FBI conducted a forensic genetic genealogy search to trace the man's family tree.
That new technology led to a break in the case earlier in 2026, KSCJ 1360 reports, when the genealogical work pointed investigators toward a paternal niece of the unidentified man living in Texas. That niece, Joan Hewlett, became the key to unlocking the mystery. DNA Solves notes that Clarence Ames never married, had no children, and was never reported missing.
Once investigators connected the DNA to Ames's family line, they were able to confirm his identity and trace his origins back to Dubuque. It remains unknown why he was in Woodbury County at the time of his death, according to DNA Solves, and his cause of death was ruled undetermined. WHO 13 reports that his cause of death may never be known, though foul play is not suspected.
A Niece's Long-Awaited Answer, and a Burial Back Home
On October 12, Ames's cremated remains were released to Hewlett, who arranged for him to be laid to rest at his parents' gravesite in Dubuque, per DNA Solves. A funeral service for Ames took place Tuesday in Dubuque, and before the service, Armstrong took family members to Correctionville, where the remains had been found nearly four decades earlier, KSCJ 1360 reports.
The identification places Ames among a small but growing number of long-unsolved Iowa cases cracked by genetic genealogy; DNA Solves describes this as the third publicly announced case in the state in which investigators used Othram's technology to identify a previously unknown individual. The approach has produced similar breakthroughs elsewhere, including a case detailed by CNN in which a cold-case victim was identified after nearly 26 years, and another Iowa case reported by ABC News, where a suspect was arrested and charged in connection with Ronald Novak's 1983 murder, though the investigation remains open and investigators believe at least one more suspect was involved.
Even with Ames's name restored, the case is not entirely closed. How he ended up in Woodbury County and the exact circumstances of his death remain unknown, and investigators are still hoping to hear from anyone who may have known him in the late 1960s to early 1970s. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Woodbury County Sheriff's Office at 712-279-6010.
