I have discovered ample evidence to suggest that Verse 1 corresponds to Des Plaines, IL;  I would like any assistance you people from Chicago can give me on this.  First off, I believe that the cask is in or around Big Bend Lake. Fortress North= Fort Sheridan, which is north of the Park Cold as Glass= The Cold Glass workshop? (actually, I think that's in Milwaukee) Friendship South= Friendship Park Conservatory, which is more southeast The wood no lion fears= Lion Woods Preserve, the forest section of Big Bend Lake In the sky the water Veers= From above, Big Bend has a narrow, curving section, like a hook Small of scale step across= Where the Lake touches the river, there are two small spits of land sticking out that look, from map's 'small scale,' like you could step across In the center of four alike= Lion Woods is between two other forest preserves above and below it.  Also, there are four parks in a Rhombus shape near by which overlaps the southern end of Lion Woods Three-winged and slight= The DeVal Interlocking Tower is a small train-oriented building located where three trans-national railroads (now metra lines) meet Our strongest tower of delight= The Sears Tower in Chicago? There's the spout! A whistle sounds!= A 'spout' where the river passes beneath the train tracks (trains used to whistle, and Des Plaines is a historic railroad town) I can send a marked map to anyone who wants to see this for themselves.  Also, Spouts and whistles are features of a teapot, of which the absolute largest is in Wyoming (also home to Devil's Tower, and the devil is traditionally associated with 'delights.') --Just some thoughts, Typler

interesting... but read the Verse 1 threads, I'm pretty sure that we have boiled it down to Houston...(the author said there was one in houston). WELCOME TO THE HUNT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! -regulus

Regulus, If you are going by what Scottrocks says, then I would caution you to not take everything everyone says at face value; Houston may or may not be definite, simply because There would not have been anywhere in a zoo that would allow burying.  They are strictly controlled environments where straws and lids are not even allowed on drink cups.  Plexiglass boxes are probably not specified, but included in the implied list of things you would be hard pressed to get permission to bury in or near an endangered animal preserve.  Additionally, I will be posting my latest discoveries, based on my profile of BP's motives and or technique.  As such, the only indication in the Desert Djinn (or whirling dervish) painting that even SUGGESTS Texas is the single shining star (The Lone Star State), the desert, and very possibly the giant pillar that looks like that tower with a white orb atop it.  Everything is abirtrary, ironic, and even fictional at best, because only 2 casks have been found.

1st off, houston is a definite, confirmed by bp!  secondly, without trying to sound like too much of an a~hole, please refrain from starting new threads for every new idea. every p & v have their own thread for easy navigation.

fox wrote:: 1st off, houston is a definite, confirmed by bp!  secondly, without trying to sound like too much of an a~hole, please refrain from starting new threads for every new idea. every p & v have their own thread for easy navigation. Adding to that, KLBT: Houston is as near a complete solve as there has been, other than the actually dug-up casques; Preiss not only confirmed the city, he confirmed the Children's Zoo as the location.  It very likely would have been found years ago if it hadn't been for the significant renovation of the site in the last 20+ years.  The whole issue of whether the zoo would allow the casque to be buried there was addressed a long time ago.  The park and the site weren't even fenced in back then.  This is all in the V1/P8 threads; I'd definitely recommend you go through and read them in detail.

bigmattyh wrote:: Adding to that, KLBT: Houston is as near a complete solve as there has been, other than the actually dug-up casques HUZZAH!! wilhouse

oh no, wilhouse is talking in code again. Huzzah looks like a simple substitution cipher to me but i just cant crack it.

whether it is in Houston or not is not really the issue... I just do not believe that particular verse goes with it.  Confirmation of a city location doesn't matter, and there is no way BP buried a cask in a zoo or near one.  Plus, I am not starting new threads for every new idea, just major ones that corroborate a great deal of evidence.  I appreciate all of your ideas and criticisms, but Houston is a gigantic city, and camels and rhinos DO happen to appear in other areas than zoos alone.  Everyone I have read (except for a few posts) agrees that if you did not find a cask, chances are it's not there.  Does anyone have actual evidence besides hearsay (I mean photographs) of what 'the number 982' refers to?  The reason I do not immediately trust a great deal of the 8000+ posts is that there is treasure involved; it is a sad fact of life that while this forum is comprised of people who are friendly, nice, and who all share a common interest, you cannot discount the possibility that things in these paintings and poems are misleading and highly multi-faceted on purpose, which leads me to believe that anyone who knows something for certain may not want to share it.  As such, the posts on this forum are a collection of opinions based loosely on empirical evidence derived from purely subjective portrayals of American (and one Canadian) cities.  Unless you are a fantasy writer/publisher, or someone who profoundly understands metaphors created from the mind of someone who did not want to tell anyone where things were outright, you cannot say you 'know' anything.  I am not trying to offend anyone, because you are all respectable professionals, with valid opinions, but so am I.

the quote confirms the City Zoo in Houston no question... -regulus

Fine then.  City Zoo, Houston, TX.  But the verse you claim may not be for that locale.  I will not agree to anything outright if a cask is not dug up.  And this is a general clarification of things I have said before-- while definite confirmation is entirely necessary, from my work in PSYOP I understand that imagination and creativity are necessary to decipher puzzles and riddles.  So everyone please understand that I am only analyzing, not confirming.

Here is a thought to (possibly) consider:  "A wingless bird, born of ancient dreams of flight" could refer to a balloon.  I mean, the space shuttle HAS wings, because it is also a sort of airplane, not to mention that early rockets have stabilizer fins at the base.  Also, a helicopter could be said to not have wings, although it is termed a Rotary-Wing craft.  I saw an issue of Popular Mechanics from circa 1950's, which talked about a wingless airplane--it was tested in North Carolina, and used barrel-shaped turbines for lift and propulsion.  Incidentally, (I may be wrong) don't NC license plates depict balloons? (I know that these are the MODERN plates, but if I am also not mistaken, the state governments do tend to places images and scenes of significance to that state...  Same with the current U-Haul trucks).

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti - the balloon idea has been suggested before. I know it's a lot to read, but you will benefit by reading the full back-log of forum entries. I know I learned a lot, and it helped me from reinventing wheels. I didn't know NC's license plate had a balloon on it. I thought it had the Wright Brothers' airplane.

let me try to simplify this. part of 'this' verse leads directly to herman park in houston. if anything were questionable, it would be the image and not the verse! this i/v pairing is about as solid as it comes. even our resident jockey, trohn, agrees with this one.

Fox, funny, what Preiss confirmed was the image!! Did you ever check out the composite image I posted? I think they go together cause you can't get to the image without the verse, and the verse isn't specific enough without the image. wilhouse

dont get me wrong, i am not questioning the image either. i just said that if anything 'could' be questioned it would be the image. i totally agree with this pairing in houston.

i wouldn't object so much to there being a new thread created here, but for the fact that the topic title says NOTHING about what is being discussed in here.  For the sake of organization, could we either lock this topic and continue in existing threads, or rename this thread so we can see what the topic is, please?

fox wrote:: let me try to simplify this. part of 'this' verse leads directly to herman park in houston. if anything were questionable, it would be the image and not the verse! this i/v pairing is about as solid as it comes. even our resident jockey, trohn, agrees with this one. Fox and I agree to disagree on so much... but for arguments sake - lets agree that: '982' is the resident train at the entrance to the HP Zoo the totem  poles are an exact replica of the ones at the zoo Wilhouse has dug every hole at the zoo (except for the one dug by Priess) New threads should only contain photos of recently uneathed casqes Priess dug holes in 1981 that would be unthinkable today 'Near Aces high" refers to 'JAX brewery. Everything else, we do not agree on. Except, Kansas sucks.

Unknown: Except, Kansas sucks. I'm still holding out hope that there's a casque in Topeka or Lawrence!

forest_blight wrote:: I'm still holding out hope that there's a casque in Topeka or Lawrence! Don't leave out Levenworth! (You can break in - breaking out is another thing)

You would absolutely not want to break into the hotbox for any reason.  The only prison where the inmates are considered more dangerous is in Marion, IL, which is a level 5.  Plus, I believe that the last even allowed casual entry to the facilty was a book-writer awhile ago.  It took him WAY too much time to get permission to do so, and he was terrified out of his mind.  I read his book too, and it was darn good.

I have neither the time nor the inclination to look at 73000+ posts on 4000+ topics, most of which have been heavily refuted (in one way or another) anyways.  Like I said, everyone is a lot better informed than they were two years ago, so I will be using the current info. Thank you for the suggestions, but I believe that a completely different type of speculation is necessary.

4000 topics??????? I suggest just reading the 12 image topics, and the 12 verse topics.  that's uh... 24 topics. We're not demanding that you read them, we're just giving you a friendly suggestion on how to get caught up. -regulus

My mistake--in THIS forum, there are 111 individual topics, with only 8475 posts between them.  ALL of them have to do with twelve paintings and twelve verses, so which ones do you mean?  Again, while I appreciate the advice, I will ONLY be taking one person's advice on what to read and when, which is my own.  I have an agenda for this hunt, the first step of which is to gather useful information.  If am very respectfully requesting that if you and everyone else would be so kind, please stop asking me to read every single post.  Because I won't.

You know, the paintings themselves put me in mind of Tarot cards...  Which ones are anyone's guess, but the Cleveland painting loos like the Knight of Cups in the Rider-Waite, and several of the other figures look like Pages, with their hoods and such.  I'm not saying this is definite.  Just an observation.

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti wrote:: My mistake--in THIS forum, there are 111 individual topics, with only 8475 posts between them.  ALL of them have to do with twelve paintings and twelve verses, so which ones do you mean?  Again, while I appreciate the advice, I will ONLY be taking one person's advice on what to read and when, which is my own.  I have an agenda for this hunt, the first step of which is to gather useful information.  If am very respectfully requesting that if you and everyone else would be so kind, please stop asking me to read every single post.  Because I won't. When I found Q4T, there weren't this many threads to read.  Coming in now,  chewing through a lot of worthless information is just a waste of time.  For someone who's been around for a while, these threads are a good source of information to look back on.  I firmly believe that the answers to all the digs have been mentioned at least once and simply discarded as rubbish.  Too many smart people here with fantastic ideas for any of the solves not to have been mentioned, at the very least, one time or another.

That is very possibly true.  I just don't want to clutter my mind with too much info because if BP was worreied that this would be solved in a few months, then the solutions must be exceedingly simple.  The "Milwaukee" painting may be the simplest of all since there is so little in it...

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti wrote:: That is very possibly true.  I just don't want to clutter my mind with too much info because if BP was worreied that this would be solved in a few months, then the solutions must be exceedingly simple.  The "Milwaukee" painting may be the simplest of all since there is so little in it... Pithy doesn't usually equate to simple - it equates to exactness.

I use 'pithy,' simple, and exact to mean the same thing, which I figured someone would pick up on-- the less info, the less ambiguous, and therefore more exact.

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti wrote:: the less info, the less ambiguous, and therefore more exact. that would certainly seem to describe your approach to this treasure hunt(at least to the ideas presented in the forum).  You should have them all dug up by the end of the week.  Good luck.

HAH! If that were true, Scott would be a rich man!  As such, the only one I've spent any great amount of time on is Milwaukee.  If you're basing that comment on the number of posts I've made, then I think I should point out (as I should have done awhile ago) that I'm compiling info I think is useful.  Definite matches to landmarks in the paintings for one, and sometimes inferences that seem intuitive or flat-out observant.

boogieman wrote:: It's true that it's too much to just read from the start....When I picked up my book and became interested in this hunt a year ago, I used the Secret Wiki to guide me to the casque believed to be closest to where I lived. Then I read the thread for the believed verse/ image match. That way I wasn't too overwhelmed. Of course as time went on and the verse/image matches changed, I ended up reading all of them and becoming interested in the other cities as well. It's a slow ramp up process. Kudos for jumping right in to several of the verses/ images! Shseverin11

I'm focusing on the one closest to me too... If I had started this three months ago, I could have explored the crap out of Houston for Y'all (...anything?), because I lived in San Antonio, and my ex-wife will soon be stationed in that city.  Believe me, I would not have been there five minutes before City Zoo became my second home.

I wish I'd spent more time emailing you than your ex, then you'd have known I was working on this. Oh well, lessons learned. I am glad we at least both live in the same city now! Love, Mom

I just did an "Escape Room" for the first time. Lots of fun. If you haven't done one yet, and you like The Secret, I highly recommend it! It would be right up your alley. (used this thread to post this, since I didn't want to start a new thread, and thought the title was amusing).

I used to love it when I was a kid, it's around 2002 I believe, it's finally here in the US?

Sadly, I read half of the posts on the first page before noticing that this thread was started in 2008. Bad form, man, but I get the joke now. Plus, I wouldn't put an Escape Room in the same category as The Secret, personally. Great topic for the general puzzle community, but those types of puzzles use a different skill set than buried treasure riddles. The funny thing is, people like the puzzles so much, they now publish kits called an "Escape Room in a Box" so you can play at home. It's a bit like Puzzle Pint, where you can go to a pub or just wait a week and print out the puzzles at home. Sometimes the environment is important, but other times it's just puzzles.

catherwood wrote:: they now publish kits called an "Escape Room in a Box" so you can play at home. There are monthly mail order murder mystery puzzles as well. Some of them can be kind of fun.

bigmattyh wrote:: Adding to that, KLBT: Houston is as near a complete solve as there has been, other than the actually dug-up casques; Preiss not only confirmed the city, he confirmed the Children's Zoo as the location. He never confirmed or denied the CZ. It’s heavily assumed from one thing he said.

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti wrote:: I have neither the time nor the inclination to look at 73000+ posts on 4000+ topics, most of which have been heavily refuted (in one way or another) anyways.  Like I said, everyone is a lot better informed than they were two years ago, so I will be using the current info. Thank you for the suggestions, but I believe that a completely different type of speculation is necessary. Whoever bumped this thread, thanks it's a treasure! This is my favorite post, where OP complains there are too many threads and so THAT'S why they made a new thread

Egbert wrote:: I just did an "Escape Room" for the first time. Lots of fun. If you haven't done one yet, and you like The Secret, I highly recommend it! It would be right up your alley. (used this thread to post this, since I didn't want to start a new thread, and thought the title was amusing). Puzzlemaking is one of tthe best things about my kids getting older. For their sixth birthday I'm making a note which reads, "Good morning! I've padlocked your room. The code is hidden in a series of puzzles throughout your room. When you get out, there's pancakes and bacon"

Kuh-Lai-Bah-Ti wrote:: Fine then.  City Zoo, Houston, TX.  But the verse you claim may not be for that locale.  I will not agree to anything outright if a cask is not dug up.  And this is a general clarification of things I have said before-- while definite confirmation is entirely necessary, from my work in PSYOP I understand that imagination and creativity are necessary to decipher puzzles and riddles.  So everyone please understand that I am only analyzing, not confirming. You don't have to apologize to the bully's. They have found the same amount of casks that you have. The only difference is that they have not had any success in years...you have not had success for a few seconds. Ask yourself who is more likely to solve the puzzle.

funsun wrote:: They have found the same amount of casks that you have. The only difference is that they have not had any success in years...you have not had success for a few seconds. funsun wrote:: I have the solution to the Image 2 and Verse 6. I am unable to retrieve the box because it is in the lawn of the Austin Texas State Capitol Building. Convenient. Ironic. And, prophetic. All at the same time.... Don't worry, you'll blink, years will pass and you'll catch up.

Fenix wrote:: The post you quoted is over a decade old. Just sayin'.... Maybe my machine displayed them in reverse order this time lol. Oops.. maybe I should've said you have been looking for it for 200 years and they have been looking for it since the Mesozoic era. Ok that works. Just kidding

I am having trouble with the fact that most of the guesses so far are mostly east side of country. Where are the hypothesis for west coast? He did say across America.

Unknown: He did say across America. Well (and welcome), if you are in New York, you have to cross America to get to San Francisco. Similarly, if you are in Chicago, you have to cross America to get to Houston. So, I think we're good. On the other hand, there's that pesky "reasonable driving distance" stipulation to consider. It's a puzzle.

DJAz wrote:: I am having trouble with the fact that most of the guesses so far are mostly east side of country. Where are the hypothesis for west coast? He did say across America. Perhaps the east coast tickets were cheaper than the west coast considerably less expensive. Preiss seemed well off, but on somewhat reasonably upper middle class or lower part of high class. Perhaps six figure earnings, but with a house, company (potentially draining a bit of money) and two children. Also most immigration was east to west. Most people pooped out by the time they hit the Mississippi.

we are talking about when he wasn't married, didn't had a house, and no kids. he was a teacher in Philly, that's around $13K a year give or take, convert to $ today, you're looking at somewhere between $85-$90K round trip from NYC to SFO in 1978 FIRST CLASS only cost $200, he can't afford it? really?

Spiritr wrote:: we are talking about when he wasn't married, didn't had a house, and no kids. he was a teacher in Philly, that's around $13K a year give or take, convert to $ today, you're looking at somewhere between $85-$90K round trip from NYC to SFO in 1978 FIRST CLASS only cost $200, he can't afford it? really? Plus...it was a biz expense...a write-off. He didn't pay for the trips directly, the (his) company did. (BPVP was founded / originally funded in '74 and, by the time The Secret came into being as a project, would have (should have) had enough operating capital to pay for related expenses, especially if he budgeted for it in advance.)

Plus he didn't travel alone.

Unknown: Plus he didn't travel alone. Given how zealously he guarded his "secrets", I have no doubt that for the most part that's exactly what he did. It was the only way that he could maintain the integrity of the puzzle and ensure that the solutions would not be compromised. If there is any evidence to the contrary (other than Cleveland, and possibly San Francisco), I am not aware of it. Are you?

I think not, at the time B.Asen was already hired as the photographer, the reason why they fly over to the Bay was because of this project. And they didn't just stayed at SF, they went down to LA as well. So my guess is they fly out together, while Asen went to take photos in his friend's house over by Delores Height, Preiss can go get construction plans and do his site inspection, hiding that thing is something he can do alone at night. And just think about it, solitarily flying back again just to hide it? No...I don't' think so.

Spiritr wrote:: we are talking about when he wasn't married, didn't had a house, and no kids. he was a teacher in Philly, that's around $13K a year give or take, convert to $ today, you're looking at somewhere between $85-$90K round trip from NYC to SFO in 1978 FIRST CLASS only cost $200, he can't afford it? really? With time value of money using the commercial rate of paper, the increase is less than one percent a year... thus if he was making $13k as a teacher in 1981... it does not correspond to 80 to 90 thousand today. It corresponds financially to around 30k. Teacher salaries these days are starting between $30k to $40K. He died bankrupt... reality. The guy was a great thinker who did not necessarily make a lot of money. His thought patterns are genius. Years after his death, his work and that of his co contributors is still mesmerizing to some and at least of interest to others.

Spiritr wrote:: So my guess is they fly out together, while Asen went to take photos in his friend's house over by Delores Height, Preiss can go get construction plans and do his site inspection, hiding that thing is something he can do alone at night. And just think about it, solitarily flying back again just to hide it? No...I don't' think so. Like you said just a guess, not taking into account at all that BP was constantly working on many books and probably made several if not many trips around the country every year visiting book fairs, Publishing conventions, being involved in marketing campaigns and doing interviews. There would have been Book Awards dinners, etc.

funsun wrote:: He died bankrupt... reality. Discontinuing the operations of a company and then using Chapter 7 Business Bankruptcy to pay off the debts of the company, through the liquidation of company assets, usually doesn't involve assets of a personal estate....examples of exceptions being, sole proprietorship or partnerships where non-exempt personal assets can be attached. (His company was Byron Preiss Visual Publications Inc....a corporation. His personal assets were separate and protected.) The company was closed, using Chapter 7 to pay of the debts of the company ....that doesn't mean that he 'died bankrupt' due to an excess amount of personal debt or that the business bankruptcy affected his personal estate. This explains the decision to cease operation, with regards to the business, not his personal estate: https://icv2.com/articles/comics/view/8272/ibooks-byron-preiss-visual-publications-file-chapter-7 'In the months after my husband's tragic accident last summer, his companies set out to honor his commitments to his authors and projects and continue his vision in publishing. We very much wanted to go forward in the spirit and direction that Byron believed in; however, it became clear that without his unique creative force driving the companies he created, this was not possible.' -- Preiss's widow Sandi Mendelson So, unless his wife Sandi filed for personal bankruptcy following his death....chapter 7 or chapter 13....you can't say that he 'died bankrupt' and left her (and his children) destitute, just because that was how they chose to close the company and cease operations. (You found a court case that shows that there was a personal Bankruptcy filing for his personal estate, either before or after his death? If not, then you can't say that 'He died bankrupt' is anywhere near 'reality'.)

funsun wrote:: He died bankrupt... reality. That is laughably inaccurate....

they actually told me they wont let me back into america cause "i cant possibly afford to travel this much" haha

ive spent approx 3000 or so dollars overall on the hunt haha...when you're obsessed...you're obsessed...but i might be one of the only people able to find something so i feel obligated, also i will honour preiss memory by revealing full detail of the puzzle which i work on busting out daily (instead of just trying to guess final location like 90% of people). (btw i dont even have a fulltime job...but i make decent enough money).