Please enable Javascript to watch this video RICHMOND, Va. (WTVR) - Countless Richmonders march by it each day, some never stop to look. Beneath the hulking granite behemoth known as Old City Hall lies a 119-year-old mystery wrapped in seven inches of warped wrought iron. In this city which reveres the past, one little landmark has slipped through the cracks. Richmond in the 1890's was a bustling hub attracting businessmen from across the south. One frequent visitor? Colonel JM Winstead from Greensboro. He was a popular and prominent banker who some said carried himself like a preacher. On the morning of August 23, 1894 the 70-year-old man climbed the steps at City Hall. “He went up to the observation deck and opened the window and went outside to the granite balcony outside,” Richmond historian and author Selden Richardson said. Winstead was there seemingly to take in the commanding sights. What happens next has been intriguing historians, like Selden Richardson, for more than a century. “This was a mind-boggling event they could not possibly understand how this could have happened,” Selden said. Winstead tumbles from the clock tower as horrified witnesses below watched the man plummet 94 feet. It's over in an instant. A mangled Winstead is impaled on the fence. The force of his fall bent the spike along the fence surrounding the Old City Hall forever. “I think there is an air of mystery surrounding the death of Col. WInstead," Winstead said. "People were shocked then as they are now.” Questions linger to this day.

What happened at the top of the tower? Did he fall? Did he jump or was he pushed?“People were so flabbergasted that this happened. It just doesn’t add up,” veteran Greensboro newspaper reporter Jim Schlosser said.Jim has been digging for answers.

“I don’t think we’ll ever know what was going on in his mind. I just can’t think of any other reason," he said. "He just had nothing to die for.”