Readers will follow the strange, yet true, journey made by a lock of Ludwig van Beethovens hair from the time it was clipped from the composers head on his deathbed in Germany in 1827 to a World War II refugee safe house in Denmark in 1943 to its eventual sale at auction in 1994. From this lock of hair, scientists were able to discover the cause of Beethovens death, a question that had long puzzled scientists and musicologists.