Jana Pruden has told thousands of stories over her years as a news reporter, but after three years, she still hasn’t written the ending to one that’s especially close to her heart.
Three years ago, Pruden attended a fashion trade show with a friend who works in the industry. They spent a considerable amount of time looking at the exhibits. As they were leaving, Pruden noticed a scarf with a newsprint pattern.
“I saw my name. I don't know how I saw that, but that's what I saw.”
Printed in the pattern on the scarf was a story she had written five years before about mad cow disease. Thus began a new journey for Pruden, to discover how her article had made its way to the garment.
“Why is that story there to begin with, and how did this scarf get made?”
The tag on the scarf reads “Made in China”. Pruden tracked down the New York based importer, who was able to tell her that they buy garments from several cities in China, but couldn’t narrow down the source.
“It was really hard to investigate.”
In addition to the story about mad cow disease, there were 13 other articles printed in the pattern. Pruden says she’s tracked down the origin of nine of them. They came from five different countries, and were written over the span of a century.
“I was obsessed with it. I would literally get up in the middle of the night and try and find these stories.”
“The only thing that links them is that they’re all on the scarf.”
One of her theories has to do with China’s recycling industry. Prior to 2018, the country accepted massive quantities of old newspapers.
“There's the potential that there's some big recycling depot and there's piles of papers and dating back that far.”
Despite her efforts, Pruden hasn’t managed to solve the mystery – yet. But she’s beat the odds once. The World Association of Newspapers says there are at least 18,000 print news agencies, who millions of newspapers every year, making her article one in billions.
“How did I end up in that spot, at that time where I shouldn’t have been and just happened to see it?”
“There’s so much synchronicity that there’s something a little bit magical about it.”
With files from Bill Fortier
