diff --git a/CONTRIBUTORS b/CONTRIBUTORS
index 986b51fdb..e5af82d2b 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTORS
+++ b/CONTRIBUTORS
@@ -113,6 +113,7 @@ Jesse Glick
 Jesse Stockall
 Jim Allers
 Joerg Wassmer
+John Sisson
 Jon Dickinson
 Jon S. Stevens
 Jose Alberto Fernandez
diff --git a/WHATSNEW b/WHATSNEW
index e7d231160..daad993f0 100644
--- a/WHATSNEW
+++ b/WHATSNEW
@@ -94,6 +94,8 @@ Changes that could break older environments:
 
 Fixed bugs:
 -----------
+* <manifest> now closes the inputstream explicitly. Bug report 39628
+
 * <rpm> now also correctly searches the first element of the path. Bug report 39345.
 
 * ant.bat now handles classpath set to "". Bug report 38914. 
diff --git a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Manifest.java b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Manifest.java
index 9f9b17ca0..1790b12d0 100644
--- a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Manifest.java
+++ b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Manifest.java
@@ -29,6 +29,7 @@ import java.util.Enumeration;
 import java.util.Hashtable;
 import java.util.Vector;
 import org.apache.tools.ant.BuildException;
+import org.apache.tools.ant.util.FileUtils;
 
 /**
  * Holds the data of a jar manifest.
@@ -698,28 +699,34 @@ public class Manifest {
      *            default manifest
      */
     public static Manifest getDefaultManifest() throws BuildException {
+        InputStream in = null;
+        InputStreamReader insr = null;
         try {
             String defManifest = "/org/apache/tools/ant/defaultManifest.mf";
-            InputStream in = Manifest.class.getResourceAsStream(defManifest);
+            in = Manifest.class.getResourceAsStream(defManifest);
             if (in == null) {
                 throw new BuildException("Could not find default manifest: "
                     + defManifest);
             }
             try {
-                Manifest defaultManifest
-                    = new Manifest(new InputStreamReader(in, "UTF-8"));
+                insr = new InputStreamReader(in, "UTF-8");
+                Manifest defaultManifest = new Manifest(insr);
                 Attribute createdBy = new Attribute("Created-By",
                     System.getProperty("java.vm.version") + " ("
                     + System.getProperty("java.vm.vendor") + ")");
                 defaultManifest.getMainSection().storeAttribute(createdBy);
                 return defaultManifest;
             } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
-                return new Manifest(new InputStreamReader(in));
+                insr = new InputStreamReader(in);
+                return new Manifest(insr);
             }
         } catch (ManifestException e) {
             throw new BuildException("Default manifest is invalid !!", e);
         } catch (IOException e) {
             throw new BuildException("Unable to read default manifest", e);
+        } finally {
+            FileUtils.close(insr);
+            FileUtils.close(in);
         }
     }