B-Bottoms FIHOTD Thread (Oak Island, Money Pit)

[B-Bottom]

I always thought this was a cool story.

 

Oak Island

 

Oak Island, Nova Scotia.Oak Island (44

[B-Bottom]

In 1965, Robert Dunfield leased the island and, using a 70 ton digging crane with a clam bucket, dug out the pit area to a depth of 140 feet (43 m) and width of 100 feet (30 m). The removed soil was carefully examined for artifacts. As a result the location of the original shaft is no longer known. Transportation of the crane to the island required the construction of a causeway (which still exists) from the western end of the island to Crandall's Point on the mainland two hundred metres away.

 

Around 1969, Daniel C. Blankenship and David Tobias formed Triton Alliance, Ltd. and bought most of the island. In 1971, Triton workers excavated a 235 foot (72 m) shaft supported by a steel caisson to bedrock. Cameras lowered down the shaft into a cave below were said to have recorded some chests, human remains, wooden cribbing and some tools but the images were not clear and none of these claims have been confirmed. The shaft subsequently collapsed and the excavation was again abandoned. This shaft was later successfully re-dug to 181 feet, reaching bedrock where work was halted due to lack of funds.

 

The Money Pit Mystery was the subject of an episode of the television series In Search of... which first aired January 18, 1979, bringing the legend of Oak Island to a wider audience. Previously the story had only been known among locals, treasure hunting groups and readers of sensational magazines and anthologies.

 

 

Pit flooding

Treasure hunters had discovered coconut fibres beneath the surface of one beach (coconuts are not indigenous to Nova Scotia). This led to suggestions the beach was converted into a giant "wick", feeding water from the ocean into the pit.

 

However, coconut fibres were used as shipping dunnage and the fibres may be have been discarded from cargo ships stopping at the island or sailing nearby. Also, the island lies on a glacial tumulus system and is underlain by a series of water-filled limestone cavities (Anhydrite) which could be responsible for the repeated flooding of the pit. Bedrock lies at a depth of 160-180 feet in the Money Pit area.

 

Upon the invitation of Boston area businessman David Mugar a two week survey was conducted by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 1995, the only scientific study ever conducted on the site. After running dye tests in the bore hole, they concluded that the flooding was caused by a natural interaction between the island's freshwater lens and tidal pressures in the underlying geology, refuting the idea of artificially constructed "box drains" or flood tunnels. Scientists also viewed some of the videos taken in 1971 and concluded that nothing of value could be determined from the murky images.

 

 

Buried treasure?

There has been wide speculation about what the pit might contain. Most suggestions include treasure buried by either Captain Kidd, British troops during the American revolution, Spanish sailors from a wrecked galleon, the Inca or even exiled Knights Templar hiding the Holy Grail in the pit.

 

The notorious pirate Blackbeard claimed he buried his treasure "where none but Satan and myself can find it," leading to inevitable suggestions that he dug the pit but there is no evidence to support this. Perhaps the most far-fetched theory is that English philosopher Francis Bacon used the pit to hide documents proving him to be the author of William Shakespeare's plays.

 

The pit may contain nothing at all. Since the 1970s fewer people have believed the pit has any connection to pirates, due to the massive scale of the subterranean structure and its similarity to other natural formations found in the area.

 

 

History or legend

Given the limited size of the original pit it may be noteworthy that no debris, lost tools or other items mentioned in the early accounts have been found. There is no surviving evidence that any elements described in the original tale (such as oak platforms, an inscribed stone, or even the tree itself) ever existed, although few details have changed since the original version of the story was published.

 

Some elements contained in the Oak Island story, such as the discovery of tantalising but inconclusive objects and a message in indecipherable code, are common in fictional works on treasure and piracy (such as the Edgar Allan Poe story The Gold Bug). This has led to speculation that the early account of the Money Pit is a combination of several works of 19th century fiction conflated with a local story about a search for buried treasure. Recent research has uncovered possible connections between the pit's 19th century pre-publication history and founders of the Mormon Church along with Masonic elements in the story's earliest oral forms, which could further indicate conflation of its origins or mis-interpretation of the site.

 

The Oak Island mystery was fictionalized in the thriller novel Riptide by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, published in 1999

 

[takeout]

That would suck if they'd been digging ten feet too far to the left this whole time.

[B-Bottom]

 

Originally posted by takeout That would suck if they'd been digging ten feet too far to the left this whole time.

 

 

yea really. Their is actually more to this story that the article doesn't really get into. here is a link with more of the story and a few pics to give you a better idea of what they are talking about

 

http://www.unmuseum.org/oakisl.htm

[lug]

I saw the "In Search Of" show mentioned. You have to wonder why anyone would go to all that trouble to build the hole in the first place and how they even managed it back then. One theory was the hole was a ruse and the "treasure" is elsewhere on the island.

[B-Bottom]

 

Originally posted by lug I saw the "In Search Of" show mentioned. You have to wonder why anyone would go to all that trouble to build the hole in the first place and how they even managed it back then. One theory was the hole was a ruse and the "treasure" is elsewhere on the island.

 

 

I've heard that too. Their are supposed to be clues all over the island. It's a fascinating story.