WI They Actually Found Something on Oak Island?

Ricardolindo

Banned
IMO, there is something in Oak Island, but we'll most likely never know what it is, the digging proccess is too hard, slow and costly.
 

Shadow Knight

I have to agree, those shows are a bit of guilty pleasure here too. Most of them are outrageous, but at the very least I do get to see places I've never heard of before and objects that do exist that I've never seen.
 

Zheng He

When I first heard about the Oak Island mystery as a kid (late 70s, early 80s) it was associated with a well known pirate, either Black Beard or Captain Kidd, I can't remember which. Now it has been associated with just about every rumor of lost treasure that exists. From a pop-psychology perspective it's quite interesting.
 

GeographyDude

Gone Fishin'
https://www.oakislandtreasure.co.uk/research-documents/theories/natural-formation/

‘ . . . If the Money Pit really was just a sinkhole caused by the possible slumping of material in a fault, it could permissible that this filling would be softer than the surrounding ground, and give the impression that it had been dug up before. This could account for what Daniel Mc Ginnis recognised as a site for buried treasure in 1795. It could also be possible that fallen trees could have sunk into the pit with its collapse, giving the appearance of platforms of logs. . . [emphases added] ’
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Now, whether we find this kind of explanation convincing, I guess might depend on how much we believe urban legend can grow and develop over time.
 

Father Maryland

Carl Schwamberger said:
Did a lot of reading on this one back in the 1980s. Perhaps my knowledge in obsolete, so if there is anything new raised since 1985 I'll be happy to hear it. All that reading boiled down to a lot of unsubstantiated claims. Many of those could be traced back to scam artists or investors trying to sell their interest off to some one else. The solid evidence seems to boil down to some tools collected from digs on the island and stored in a local museum. These tools are characteristic of those made in the Netherlands, the modern Belgium, and used in the Spanish Empire circa the 16th Century. They are a assortment of carpentry and digging tools, and some fasteners. Less solid evidence is in the testimony of the original mine shaft. The claims of the fibre matting under the shore line rocks, & a few other details. The tools suggest a Spanish ship was ported, beached or stranded on Oak Island, & repaired, or perhaps burned or destroyed in a storm. The Gulf Stream runs a few hundred kilometers south and east of Oak Island & that was the return route of the Spanish treasure ships from the New World to Spain. It is possible one or more of these ships laid up at Oak Island after storm damage off the north American coast. The original explanation, that of a Pirates stop over would be more supported were the tools of English of French make. There is also the suggestion the tools were left by Basque fishermen. Not impossible. tho fishermen working the Grand Banks would be more likely to layover on the New Foundland coast.

Occams Razor would suggest the most likely find at Oak Island would be one of the many lost Spanish cargo or treasure ships. Sunk a few hundred meters off the islands shore. Second most likely would be the pirates treasure or similar stash of legend. Given how throughly the island has been worked over by the near continual stream of two centuries of treasure hunters its unlikely any such thing is there. But, its not impossible.
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Couldn't pirates theoretically have stolen the tools? Why would you assume pirates of a specific nationality would use tools solely of their own nationality?
Mad Bad Rabbit said:
Time travelers built it (are going to have built it?) after the show was cancelled in 2057.
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What if it really was time travelers? Only instead of actually burying treasure they just decided to start a rumor so people would waste all their time and money for centuries digging holes on the same tiny island.
Zheng He said:
I think a successful find on Oak Island could lead to any number of spin offs because finding something, even a garden variety treasure from some pirate who has been lost to history will suddenly give credibility to every rumor, legend, and conspiracy theory of lost treasure that you can think of. Kind of like how the Coelacanth is held up as evidence to support every cryptozoological rumor out there.

The show is already on its 6th season and there has been one spin (Curse of Civil War Gold) and that is without finding anything. If they actually find something the flood gates are open. What's next? Curse of the Lost Dutchman's Mine? Curse of Geronimo's Treasure? Use your imagination, the possibilities are endless.
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One that's been fascinating me recently is three million lost Phillipino silver pesos. When the Phillipines were falling in 1941 the Phillipino government emptied their bank vaults. They sent gold bullion to Australian via sub, they burned the paper money, and millions of silver peso coins were dumped into the ocean. Most was officially either recovered by the Japanese during wartime, by the US immediately after the war, or the Phillipino government later. Officially three million silver peso coins were never recovered (though most were probably actually recovered by illegal salvagers or fishermen). Each peso coin having about half an ounce worth of pure silver. Meaning 1.5 million Oz of silver at 15 bucks an ounce.
 

Zheng He

Father Maryland said:
Couldn't pirates theoretically have stolen the tools? Why would you assume pirates of a specific nationality would use tools solely of their own nationality?


What if it really was time travelers? Only instead of actually burying treasure they just decided to start a rumor so people would waste all their time and money for centuries digging holes on the same tiny island.


One that's been fascinating me recently is three million lost Phillipino silver pesos. When the Phillipines were falling in 1941 the Phillipino government emptied their bank vaults. They sent gold bullion to Australian via sub, they burned the paper money, and millions of silver peso coins were dumped into the ocean. Most was officially either recovered by the Japanese during wartime, by the US immediately after the war, or the Phillipino government later. Officially three million silver peso coins were never recovered (though most were probably actually recovered by illegal salvagers or fishermen). Each peso coin having about half an ounce worth of pure silver. Meaning 1.5 million Oz of silver at 15 bucks an ounce.
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I've heard about that last one but not in association with Oak Island. I love it...
 
Chris Triangle

Chris Triangle

Zheng He said:
When I first heard about the Oak Island mystery as a kid (late 70s, early 80s) it was associated with a well known pirate, either Black Beard or Captain Kidd, I can't remember which. Now it has been associated with just about every rumor of lost treasure that exists. From a pop-psychology perspective it's quite interesting.
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It's Kidd. The reason is largely because he claimed to have additional treasure before he was executed and is rumored to have buried a large treasure on an unidentified island "East of Boston", which Oak Island is. That's what the first searchers thought they were looking for. He was also one of the few Pirates (though it could be argued he really was a privateer) I've heard of who actually was known to have buried his treasure, though the one he hid on Gardiner's island clearly wasn't well hidden because somebody apparently dug that up pretty quickly. Interestingly, he did have a previous record of digging tunnels on an island near Madagascar. I don't remember whether there was treasure involved but it sounds an awful lot like the kind of experience that would come in handy if he were to attempt a project to hide a much bigger prize.

The problem is, in Kidd's time, it would have been hard to pull something big off in Oak island without being noticed and it's clear that he didn't spend weeks or months in that area doing things. It also seems unlikely he or any other pirate/privateer would have had a crew loyal enough to keep quiet about it so he doesn't seem to be mentioned all that much in discussions about Oak island.
 
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Father Maryland

Chris Triangle said:
It's Kidd. The reason is largely because he claimed to have additional treasure before he was executed and is rumored to have buried a large treasure on an unidentified island "East of Boston", which Oak Island is. That's what the first searchers thought they were looking for. He was also one of the few Pirates (though it could be argued he really was a privateer) I've heard of who actually was known to have buried his treasure, though the one he hid on Gardiner's island clearly wasn't well hidden because somebody apparently dug that up pretty quickly. Interestingly, he did have a previous record of digging tunnels on an island near Madagascar. I don't remember whether there was treasure involved but it sounds an awful lot like the kind of experience that would come in handy if he were to attempt a project to hide a much bigger prize.

The problem is, in Kidd's time, it would have been hard to pull something big off in Oak island without being noticed and it's clear that he didn't spend weeks or months in that area doing things. It also seems unlikely he or any other pirate/privateer would have had a crew loyal enough to keep quiet about it so he doesn't seem to be mentioned all that much in discussions about Oak island.
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At this point the treasure hunters are effectively searching for artifacts of past treasure hunters.
 
unclepatrick

unclepatrick

Chris Triangle said:
It's KWhyidd. The reason is largely because he claimed to have additional treasure before he was executed and is rumored to have buried a large treasure on an unidentified island "East of Boston", which Oak Island is. That's what the first searchers thought they were looking for. He was also one of the few Pirates (though it could be argued he really was a privateer) I've heard of who actually was known to have buried his treasure, though the one he hid on Gardiner's island clearly wasn't well hidden because somebody apparently dug that up pretty quickly. Interestingly, he did have a previous record of digging tunnels on an island near Madagascar. I don't remember whether there was treasure involved but it sounds an awful lot like the kind of experience that would come in handy if he were to attempt a project to hide a much bigger prize.

The problem is, in Kidd's time, it would have been hard to pull something big off in Oak island without being noticed and it's clear that he didn't spend weeks or months in that area doing things. It also seems unlikely he or any other pirate/privateer would have had a crew loyal enough to keep quiet about it so he doesn't seem to be mentioned all that much in discussions about Oak island.
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Why would Kidd go to all the trouble to create the elaborate pit systems?
Why would he spend the time ?
Why not just buried it where it will latter be easier to dig up?
And remember that most pirates did not bury treasure, they slip it up between members of the crew.
The idea of burying the Treasure is more the creation of Robert Lewis Stevenson , not real pirates.
 

Carl Schwamberger

Father Maryland said:
Couldn't pirates theoretically have stolen the tools? Why would you assume pirates of a specific nationality would use tools solely of their own nationality?...
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Most Pirates were actually privateers, who were usually outfitted by the sponsoring nation. The free pirates of the Carribean became a thing after the 16th Century, plus they seldom ventured north to the cold barren New England and New France coasts. So tools originating in the Spanish Netherlands mid 16th Century would be odds on off a Spanish ship. If it had been a English or French ship one would expect at least some tools from the forges of Lille or Manchester to be mixed in.

Would be ironic if there actually was a ship load of treasure lying a fews hundred meters off the island, while two centuries worth of fools had been mucking about what amounted to a survivors camp ashore.
 

GeographyDude

Gone Fishin'
weasel_airlift said:
In that particular instance, I would only question someone mistaking a fallen tree or two for a platform.
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I would question it, too, if the person is trying to tell the truth. If they’re trying to sell the next dig to promoters, then that’s an entirely different matter.

But I do wonder about the growth of urban legends . . . when a person is legitimately trying to honestly repeat the details most important to them. Over several retelling by several different people, how much do the facts morph?

Say at the 50 percentile, where half the cases are more extreme and half are less.
 

Carl Schwamberger

GeographyDude said:
...
But I do wonder about the growth of urban legends . . . when a person is legitimately trying to honest repeat the details most important to them. Over several retelling by several different people, how much do the facts morph. Say at the 50 percentile, where half the cases are more extreme and half are less.
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Theres academic studies on that. One of my acquaintances David Sedivic was doing research on this back in the early 1990s at Purdue University. Specifically in this case on office rumors.
 

Ramontxo

Donor
In the (slightly improbable) case of something worthy being found, what are the relevant Canadian laws like? One of my close friends is an archaeologist and his last work was in an bureau contracted by the Gipuzkoa local authorities to inspect the public works. Once they stopped for a time (until fully investigated) the building of a road when they found something.I don't see the American TV Show being that careful
 
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