If the skull in question does belong to Packer, it is presumed that his head was removed from his body shortly before or after his burial, was then dissected with the brain being removed for study, and was then preserved through an arsenic curing process. It is then said to have fallen into the hands of a traveling sideshow, which displayed it, until it was later sold to a private party who in turn later sold it to Ripley's. As of 2008, the skull is reported to be at the Ripley's Museum in San Antonio, Texas, following its relocation from their New Orleans facility in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.