On June 26, 1995, a 19-year-old hitchhiker with shaggy blonde hair climbed into a Volkswagen van in Virginia. The vehicle belonged to a 21-year-old student named Michael Eric Hager who was traveling from Fairfax, Va. to his mother’s house in Inman, S.C. Neither of the two men would be seen alive again after that night.

Nobody knows why Hager decided to pick up the soft-spoken hitchhiker that night—or even if they had met each other prior. The two possibly bonded over their love of music. The hitchhiker was an avid Grateful Dead fan, sporting the band’s T-shirt with his worn-out blue jeans.

At some point that day, Hager’s van veered off the road and hit a tree. Both of the men suffered head injuries, and were presumed to have died instantly. The hitchhiker’s injuries made him unrecognizable.

Attempts to reach the Virginia State Police Department have gone unanswered at the time of publication, but in 2014, Lt. Ted Jones of the Virginia State Police Department, gave this statement to the Huffington Post:

“There was no presence of drugs in either of their systems. It’s my opinion that the driver fell asleep at the wheel. That is based upon the lengthy and gradual departure of the vehicle from the paved surface.”

Hager was soon identified by family members. But nobody knew who the young hitchhiker was. He wasn’t carrying any belongings other than a lighter, a few coins, and two scalped ticket stubs to a Grateful Dead concert. A note with a number scribbled on it was found near his body.

The note read: “Jason, Sorry we had to go, see ya around, call me [redacted]. Caroline T. + Caroline O.”

The scribbled phone number revealed no area code and was a dead end for police.

Since he had no identification, the hitchhiker was deemed “Grateful Doe.” Days go by and Grateful Doe’s identity still remained a mystery. Fingerprint analysis was unsuccessful.

The police were stumped.

Days fade into months. Months turn into years. Eventually, the police forget about the case of the young drifter.

Years later, a 25-year-old Australian crimes and mystery fan, named Layla Betts, was reading about unsolved cases associated with music. That’s when she stumbled upon the story of Grateful Doe, which had become somewhat of a legend on Grateful Dead online forums. Immediately, Betts (otherwise known as Reddit user zombiegrey) was drawn to his story.

“The case really stuck with me, as Grateful Doe could have been one of my friends—he could have been me,” Betts tells Upvoted.

Betts continues:

“I always found something so heartbreaking about the fact that Grateful Doe had just been following the tour of a band he loved. I’m a huge music nerd and fan, and there was something that made me very sad about somebody experiencing the concert of a band he loved, and then sadly passing away, and remaining unidentified. “He reminds me of many of my friends: Travelers, youth who want to experience the things that they love, and the world. It breaks my heart that he lost his life so young, and that he was without his name for so long.”

In 2014, Betts began posting about Grateful Doe on Reddit. She even shared digitally reconstructed images of the hitchhiker, hoping to stumble upon any leads. In January, the Reddit community Grateful Doe was created in order to keep track of any possible updates associated with the case. Betts’ work to get the word out eventually paid off: The photos went viral and the community eventually grew to thousands of members.

According to Betts, the former roommate of a man named Jason Callahan contacted her after he came across the images of Grateful Doe posted online.

“He commented on the post originally, and him and I began private messaging and discussing it further and further. All of the points added up, and everything seemed very similar. He even went on to say that the reconstructions looked like the Jason that he knew,” Betts explains. “Him and I talked for days, usually, with myself only getting a few hours sleep.”

The man described Jason Callahan as a young, free, hippie surfer. At the time, Callahan was working at the local McDonald’s and discussed subjects like atheism and hallucinogens, he said. And much like the deceased hitchhiker, Callahan was a “major Deadhead.”

The biggest piece of evidence, however, was that the roommate hadn’t seen Callahan since early 1995.

Still, neither the roommate nor Betts could be sure the missing hitchhiker was Callahan without concrete proof. So the roommate sent Betts photos of Callahan, which she subsequently shared with the Reddit community.

Amazingly, Callahan’s mother, Margaretta Evans, chanced upon the photographs the same month the Grateful Doe subreddit was created. She filed a missing persons report shortly thereafter with the Myrtle Beach, S.C. police department.

According to the report, she had not seen or heard from her son since June 1995, after he left to follow the Grateful Dead on tour.

On Thursday, Evans was finally able to get closure: The Virginia Medical Examiner’s office confirmed that Jason Callahan is, in fact, Grateful Doe after matching DNA samples obtained from his family. Although they helped solved a decades-old mystery, it was a somber moment for both Betts and members of the Grateful Doe Reddit community.

“The reaction has been unbelievable. Some people have been happy, most people have been sad, a lot of people can’t believe that all of this has happened, and that it all started from some posts on Reddit and Imgur,” shared Betts. “A lot of people have stated that they have renewed hope in the internet, particularly when it comes to working on these mysteries.”

Callahan’s half-sister, Shannon Michelson, allegedly left this statement on the Grateful Doe Facebook page:

“I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of you. For everyone on this Facebook page as well as all the Websleuths and people on Reddit who followed this case adamantly. Had I not found the post and Reddit pages in January, I would have never known that my brother Jason was still missing, or what happened to him. “Thanks to you all I was able to talk to Jason’s mom and find out more about my brother who I haven’t seen since I was a young girl. I also would have never known about an unidentified body in Virginia. Thanks to all your hard work I was able to submit my dna and that’s what confirmed Jason’s identity. I ask that you all keep Jason’s mom in your prayers as she is hurting more than anyone ever should. God bless you all & thank you for helping me get some closure.”

And what becomes of the Reddit Grateful Doe community now that the case has been solved?

“Our whole subreddit, r/gratefuldoe, is [now] dedicated to bringing renewed interest to the cases of unidentified persons around the world,” Betts explains. “We are hoping that we are able to bring in more information to these cases to hopefully solve them, simply [by] posting them on the Internet.”