It is a bronze chest filled with gold nuggets, ancient coins, precious jewels and undefined objects. Estimated value: approximately 1 million euros, which officially makes it the most important treasure in the history of the United States. For years, it has been an object of absolute fascination for thousands of Internet users who have carried out a gigantic investigation – online, then sometimes on the ground – in order to determine its exact location.
Popular Mechanics recounts their quest, starting by following Ryan Bavetta, an engineer who has spent many nights in his office looking for clues and who has already embarked “for real” on the trail of the treasure. It happened twice: the first time he camped alone for a week at Yellowstone National Park (Wyoming, Montana, Idaho); the second, he descended the Madison River in an inflatable buoy accompanied by his wife.
Ryan Bavetta began searching for this treasure in 2018. Others have been on his trail since 2010, when the competition was launched by a wealthy octogenarian: art collector Forrest Fenn. But on June 6, 2020, the announcement fell like a cleaver: the loot would have been found, we learned in a press release published by the organizer, without however having more elements on its location or on the identity of the person who got their hands on it.
The information should have prompted the participants to stop dead and resume a normal life. However, the lack of details has made Internet users want to continue their research: has the treasure really been found? And if so, where, by whom and by what means?
Six index-shaped stanzas
Forrest Fenn had a blast when he launched “The Hunt” in 2010. After hiding (or having hidden) a treasure in the Rocky Mountains, this art dealer published his memoir, The Thrill of the Chase (which can be translated as “The thrill of the hunt”), a work in which could read six stanzas of a cryptic poem in the form of a gigantic clue.
In ten years, it is estimated that around 400,000 people have launched themselves, with varying degrees of commitment, into the analysis of the poem and therefore into the search for the loot. For our man, it was undoubtedly the adventure of a lifetime, meticulously prepared for a long time. Since 2010, he has indeed published two other volumes of his memoirs, but also hundreds of blog articles and online albums. Everything was likely to be a new clue.
Generous, playful, Forest Fenn has also granted numerous interviews to the press and has never refused to discuss with participants. “He answered each of our questions with a riddle, we were all hanging on his lips”recalls one of the treasure seekers.
Alas, real life has sometimes caught up with our man, victim of harassment, threats and attempts at blackmail from people who decided to break the rules and forget the playful aspect of the quest. Some even broke into his home to get their hands on documents that could indicate the location of the treasure.
It should also be noted that five people died while conducting their research in the field: by taking foolish risks, they ended their quest by a fatal fall or drowning. For this set of reasons, Forrest Fenn had therefore decided to put an end to “The Hunt”. But some clever guy apparently pulled the rug out from under him by choosing this moment to get his hands on the bronze chest. And so it was that in June 2020, Forrest Fenn posted the following message:
“THE TREASURE HAS BEEN FOUND. It was under a canopy of stars, in the lush vegetation of the Rocky Mountains, and hadn’t moved from where I had hidden it there over ten years ago. I don’t know the person who found it, but the poem in my book led her to her exact location… So the search is over.”
Game not over
But here it is: some did not believe it, believing that it was only a message intended to discourage the less obstinate, or even to provide a new clue. This is where Forrest Fenn seems to have realized that “The Hunt” was no longer his and that this hunt would never truly be over no matter what he did.
Things don’t end there. On September 7, 2020, the octogenarian passed away. It was the moment that medical school student Jack Stuef chose to come out of the woods and proclaim everywhere that he was the big winner of “The Hunt”. But Ryan Bavetta and other netizens began to doubtalerted by a series of elements that seem suspicious to them: did Jack Stuef find the treasure honestly, or was he one of those who tried to cheat by extorting information from Forrest Fenn?
A new investigation, partially judicial this time, was then launched. Lawsuits were initiated; they have reached stalemates. The Jack Stuef affair will probably remain a mystery for a long time to come, especially as Ryan Bavetta and the others are beginning to lose interest in it… and to ogle other hidden treasures on American territory, such as one of the twelve ceramic boxes that the writer Byron Preiss claims to have hidden in 1982. And which have not yet been found.
