Forrest Fenn's Treasure (Update)

Show Notes

• Unlike so many tales of buried treasure, the story of Forrest Fenn’s lost loot proved to be all too real because it’s no longer lost. Proof of that surfaced about a year ago. If you’re unfamiliar with the story, Fenn was an aging amateur archaeologist who reportedly amassed a fortune in gold and jewels while doing controversial explorations in the southwest. A self-described millionaire, Fenn came under FBI scrutiny once for selling Native American artifacts he claimed to have found in the Four Corners area, but no charges were filed. He did, however, come under heavy criticism for buying and excavating (some would say desecrating) a Pueblo Indian site in New Mexico which may have been the source of his treasure.
• Fenn said he’d hidden a foot-square treasure chest stuffed with valuables, claiming it was loaded with emeralds, diamonds and gold coins and weighed about 40 pounds. Diagnosed with cancer in 1988, Fenn said he filled the chest with treasure and planned to take it up into the Rockies to die beside it, maybe thinking he could take it with him? Well, it turned out that Fenn survived his brush with cancer and tucked the chest away in his house for 20 years. But when the Great Recession hit in 2008, he decided to bury it in the Rockies and launch what became a massive, international treasure hunt. The reason he did it, Fenn said, was to give hope to people who might have lost their jobs and to encourage families to get outside and get fresh air.
• He published a poem with clues for finding the treasure and challenged people to go out and look for it. All anyone knew was that it was hidden somewhere in a thousand-mile stretch of the Rockies between Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the Canadian border. He estimated that some 350,000 people had trekked through the mountains looking for his treasure chest without finding it. He’d told no one the location, not even his wife. The fear was that if Fenn died, the secret of the treasure’s location would go to the grave with him.
• To say that people became obsessed with finding the treasure would be an understatement. At least 5 people died searching for it. But the effort to find the treasure ended last June when Fenn announced that one man had indeed recovered the hidden chest stuffed with valuables. Fenn lived just long enough to see that happen. He died just a few months later. What many people don’t know is that before his death, Fenn had been hit with several lawsuits by disgruntled and angry treasure seekers claiming they should have the treasure even though they’d never found it. One of those lawsuits now targets the eventual finder of the treasure. He’d tried to remain anonymous, fearing both litigation and physical harm. The plaintiff in that case claims the finder stole his strategy to recover the treasure, even though the finder had never heard of the plaintiff.
• Now, all of this would seem pretty silly if it weren’t for the human lives and untold thousands of dollars lost in litigation over something that may have been ill-gotten to begin with. Proverbs 1:19 says, “Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain; it takes away the life of its possessors.” The Bible doesn’t say that searching for buried treasure is a sin, but it does say that the love of money is a sin and obviously risking your life in the sometimes harsh environment of the Rocky Mountains is foolish. The Bible does tell us how we must avoid a “get rich quick” mentality. Proverbs 21:5 tells us, “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.”
• So that’s your modern-day tale of buried treasure. We hope you find it a cautionary tale.

On this program we also answer your questions:

• If I’ve lost my stocks’ certificates, how can I get replacements proving that I own them?
• I have an IRA and part of it is invested in real estate investment trusts. I have 3 reits and one of them is traded and two aren’t. What are my options? I don’t want to incur any penalties.
• I have 5 CDs. They’re traditional IRAs. I was thinking of moving them into a guaranteed lifetime fixed annuity. What are your thoughts on this?