2nd true story of how treasure lores begin:
A friend of mine was working an old-town sidewalk demolition tearout. Each day the workers would tear out several more store-front's length of sidewalk, and fill it back in with new cement right after lunch, all -in-the-same-day. So my friend had to work the naked dirt in the short amount of hours that the soil was exposed, before the new walks were laid in. And since the project was multiple blocks long, each side of the street, the project went on for several weeks, to cover the length a little at a time.
And as the project continued, the workers began to be curious. They'd come over at the end of each of his hunts, and see what his latest finds were for each day. And my friend passed out common IH's, buffalos, etc.... as "well placed bribes" to keep them chomping at the bit to turn a blind eye to his daily presence there
One such day, my friend found an old looking owl-shaped amulet (like a lapel pin type thing). He rubbed it, and it showed gold color. He noticed that the eyes had some sort of red stones. As he showed it to the workers later, he mused that it "might be gold" (on account of the color). And that the red stones for the eyes "might be rubies". And then mused that it "might be 1870s or '80s (based on the age of commensurate coins he'd been finding in that stretch). The workers passed it around to each other to look at and handle, fascinated with this latest find!
That night, my friend went home to sort and clean that day's finds. When he got to the owl pendant thing, he figured out that it was only gold plated. Not real gold. And as for the red stones? Just glass chips. Turns out the thing was just 1920s worthless costume jewelry. So he pitched it in the trash.
The next day he was out there again. This time however, he noticed a worker on a tractor watching him intently. Every time he'd glance that worker's way, he could tell this worker was studying him , curious etc... Eventually that equipment worker got up the nerve to walk over and talk to my friend. My friend could see that it was a new worker, who hadn't previously been on the job prior to this day.
The worker asked my friend what he was finding. It just so happened that on this particular day, my friend had found nothing but a few pieces of junk. When he told the worker he wasn't finding anything, the worker then proceeded to tell my friend how there had been another md'r there the day before, who was finding "all sorts of gold and silver coins!"
My friend was shocked. At first he thought that perhaps someone had come after he'd left, and found something he'd missed! So he pressed the worker for details on this "mysterious md'r who'd scored all this gold and silver". During the course of the details that the worker was giving, a curious clue came out: "a gold owl". At that second, my friend realized that this worker was talking about HIM! So he corrected the worker and told him:
"No, it was only a few silver coins [not "tons"] and no, there was no "gold coins", (only a few IHs, early wheats, and a few barbers & seateds,
total for many days combined). And "no, the owl wasn't gold, it was only gold plated junk from the 1920s" etc....
As the worker listened to all this, he sternly disagreed. He knew for a fact that what he was talking about was iron-clad true. How did he know? Because the other workers, that morning, around the water cooler, had told him! They'd "seen it with their own eyes". So upon my friend breaking the news to him, he merely assumed that there must be another hunter, another owl, etc..... He refused to believe there wasn't "gold and silver galore" being found, and that, therefore, it must be someone else.
Ok, now figure this: If 100 yrs. from now, that new worker's observations were put into a book or article somewhere, what would it say? It would say there's "gold and silver under the sidewalks" and that "some guy back in 2001 was scarfing up on valuables", blah blah blah. And when you go to "check the facts", it would seem iron-clad true. Because:
a) there was eye-witnesses! They handled it with their own hands !!
b) these are duly appointed city public work's guys, authorized to be behind the yellow tape and barricades. Not just some outsider with no authority, say-so, etc....
c) And if someone 100 years from now reads that, let's say they go to city hall for permission to "dig up the sidewalks". The city replies "no". Well THAT TOO is just FURTHER PROOF of the CERTAIN treasure under the sidewalks. Why ? Because certainly the city is hiding the fact that they must know of the treasure there, and wants to keep it for themselves, right ? (I smell a conspiracy, don't you?)
And notice this "he said she said" game happened in the course of a SINGLE NIGHT. So imagine how much goes down over 100 yrs and multiple people.
I figured by now that the Dutchman, Sublett, Adams, would at least have some faithful followers putting those possibilities on the list.
