A New Mexico man who hid a treasure chest worth more than $1 million in the Rocky Mountains more than a decade ago says the hunt is finally over.
Forrest Fenn, the 89-year-old antiques dealer who hid the treasure, confirmed that it had been found on Sunday in a post on his website and in an interview with the Santa Fe New Mexican. Fenn declined to share the identity of the person who'd found the treasure but said he had been sent a picture of the treasure a few days ago.
"It was under a canopy of stars in the lush, forested vegetation of the Rocky Mountains and had not moved from the spot where I hid it more than 10 years ago," Fenn said on his website. "I do not know the person who found it, but the poem in my book led him to the precise spot."
Fenn did not reveal where the treasure had been hidden.
Fenn hid a bronze chest filled with gold and other valuable artifacts in the Rocky Mountains in 2010. He then published clues pointing to the chest's location in a 24-line poem in his autobiography.
Hundreds of thousands of people traveled to the Rockys in search of Fenn's treasure. According to the Santa Fe New Mexican, some people even quit their jobs in the hopes of finding the treasure.
But Fenn's hunt has not been without controversy. The Associated Press reports that at least four people have died while searching for the treasure.
The Santa Fe New Mexican also reports that a Chicago real estate attorney has filed a lawsuit, claiming she had solved the puzzle but her solution was "hacked." Another man from Colorado Springs, Colorado, filed a lawsuit against Fenn in December, claiming Fenn "deprived him of the treasure through fraudulent statements and misleading clues." The lawsuit was thrown out in February.
"I congratulate the thousands of people who participated in the search and hope they will continue to be drawn by the promise of other discoveries," Fenn said.
