The Fascinating Story of ‘The Great Imposter’ Who Fooled the World
Ferdinand Waldo Demara Jr. saved the Korean War wounded while posing as a surgeon.
This is the story of Ferdinand Waldo Demara Jr., more commonly known as ‘Fred,’ and how he came to be known as ‘The Great Imposter.’ As a man of immense intelligence and high IQ, Fred possessed great skill in the art of deception.
In the 23 years that he spent as a professional confident man, Fred was able to impersonate people from numerous professions. Some of them included: dean of philosophy at a college in Pennsylvania, a lawyer, a naval surgeon, a child-care expert, an assistant warden at the prison, a zoology graduate, a cancer researcher, a hospital elderly, a teacher, a doctor of applied psychology, a civil engineer, a sheriff’s deputy.
The long list of impersonations he carried out during his career reveals why he was perhaps considered the greatest imposter of all time.
Fred’s Rise to Becoming the ‘Great Imposter’
Born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1921, Fred belonged to an affluent family. During the Great Depression’s initial phases, his father, Demara Sr. faced some financial troubles due to which the family had to relocate.
