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Speaker 1: Ridiculous. Crime is a production of I heart radio. Hey,

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth Doutton, do you know it's ridiculous? Oh, I'm so

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Speaker 1: glad you asked. I do. It's actually human arrogance, like no,

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Speaker 1: I mean for real, like you know, we always think like, oh,

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Speaker 1: we're so special, but it turns out like if you

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Speaker 1: really look around and you investigate, like animal research, you

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Speaker 1: find that animals are just like us. Like, for instance,

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Speaker 1: did you know that it's been noted in captivity that

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Speaker 1: killer whales can learn to speak bottlenose dolphin? Really, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and not only that, sperm whales in the wild, like

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Speaker 1: in the Caribbean, they speak with an accent that other

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Speaker 1: whales can't. Do they when they speak Dolphin? Are they

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Speaker 1: speaking in a heavy whale accent? I wonder, but sperm

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Speaker 1: whales speak with their own specific Caribbean accent exactly like.

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Speaker 1: I just would love to hear what that sounded like.

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Speaker 1: And Cats, you know, like we think like Oh, cats

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Speaker 1: don't really like speak English like like well, it turns

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Speaker 1: out they do. They understand their name, they just choose

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Speaker 1: not to respond. They just ignore you when you say

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Speaker 1: their name. But they do. And then also, like, for instance, cows, right. Cows.

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Speaker 1: Did you know that they love Cool Jazz? Yeah, cows,

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Speaker 1: if you played cool jazz, they will produce one point,

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Speaker 1: one point five more pints of milk per day for Jazz.

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Speaker 1: For Yeah, well, for any like. You know, Cool Colm Jazz,

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Speaker 1: smooth jazz, Cool Jazz, really calming music, often warm. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: the quiet, quiet, wow, some animals are just like us.

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Speaker 1: Everybody always thinks that we're so special. Human arrogance. Telling

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Speaker 1: your ridiculous agreed, that is ridiculous. Do you know what

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Speaker 1: else is ridiculous? Oh, you got one. Yeah, throwing a

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Speaker 1: bunch of gems on the ground, calling it a motherload.

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Speaker 1: It sounds like some one of my uncles would do.

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Speaker 1: Probably this is ridiculous crime. A podcast about absurd and

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Speaker 1: outrageous capers, heists and cons. It's always murder free. And

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Speaker 1: guess what ridiculous? I've talked about the California Gold Rush

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Speaker 1: in the eighteen fifties before in my life, and also

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Speaker 1: talking to you here, Um, Shanghai, Kelly and all that

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Speaker 1: great episode to the UK. Right, yeah, and I've talked

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Speaker 1: about the Yukon gold rush eighteen sixties, soapy Smith. Today

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Speaker 1: I have the story of a diamond rush sort of.

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Speaker 1: I didn't know there were such a thing as diamond rush.

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Speaker 1: This sort of by the eighteen seventies, right, the golden

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Speaker 1: silver rushes of forty and fifty nine respectively had petered out.

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Speaker 1: In the late eighteen sixties, diamonds were discovered in South

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Speaker 1: Africa and so optimistic prospectors started looking around North America

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Speaker 1: figuring look, we got gold, we got silver, diamonds were amazing.

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Speaker 1: So a few were actually found near Plasserville, California, in

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Speaker 1: gold country. There were a few verbal accounts from Western explorers,

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Speaker 1: but no one found like a huge mine a big

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Speaker 1: load of them. Enter Philip Arnold. No, I don't really

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Speaker 1: know about where you find diamonds, like in the what

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Speaker 1: type of rock strata or like you know gold, you

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Speaker 1: need certain granite qualities, right, you need certain rock formations

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Speaker 1: with diamonds. Do we even have the geology? Isn't there

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Speaker 1: one where you look for courts somewhere? Yeah, I thought

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Speaker 1: that was with gold. Yeah, basically like streaks. Of course

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Speaker 1: I don't know diamonds. If there's a distinct smell, it's

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Speaker 1: an ore. Right, you gotta Break Open the Rock and

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Speaker 1: see the diamonds inside. So how are you going to

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Speaker 1: know anyway. I just wonder what they were looking for.

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Speaker 1: You look for Cay Jeweler's in the in the wild.

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Speaker 1: Philip Arnold. So he was born in Kentucky in eighteen

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Speaker 1: twenty nine. Does it really matter when? But as a

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Speaker 1: young man he dropped out of school and he wanted

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Speaker 1: to apprentice as a hatter, but he found that it

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Speaker 1: didn't suit him. So what did he do? He ran away.

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Speaker 1: I was gonna became cobb when you take a job

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Speaker 1: and it's not a good fit, you just straight everyone

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Speaker 1: to abandon every flee arms of flaylan. So he lied

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Speaker 1: about his age and enrolled in the army and he

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Speaker 1: served in the Mexican war. So he was out by

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Speaker 1: forty eight and after that he goes to California to

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Speaker 1: work as a gold rush forty niner. This guy's hitting

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Speaker 1: all the big marks. Totally doesn't strike it rich, runs

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Speaker 1: away arms flaalan. So he worked on all these Um,

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Speaker 1: he worked on various mining expeditions in the West for decades. Right. Um,

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Speaker 1: he did go back to Kentucky in eighteen fifty five

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Speaker 1: and he got married and then he went back again

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Speaker 1: in eighteen sixty two to buy some property he went

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Speaker 1: back during the war. Wanna say suspicious timing. Property going cheap.

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Speaker 1: I met this real cheap property in Kentucky right about now, colonel.

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Speaker 1: He's an opportunist. So he goes to Arizona and there

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Speaker 1: he meets another dude from Kentucky named Asbury harpending. That's

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Speaker 1: a hell of a Kentucky name. He's one of California's

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Speaker 1: foremost financiers. I Bet Asbury harpending. Is it harpending harpending?

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Speaker 1: I can't ask him, he's dead. It's all of them.

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Speaker 1: So in the mid eighteen sixties he goes to work

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Speaker 1: for Harpendings Lincoln Gold Mine Company in Plaster County California.

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Speaker 1: So PLASTERVILLE, plastic. One of the board members is an

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Speaker 1: associate of harpendings and he is a dude named George Roberts.

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Speaker 1: Are you writing all of this down? Taking copy's notes?

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Speaker 1: Thank God, because I'm not. In a two thousand four

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Speaker 1: article in Smithsonian magazine, which, by the way, is amazing. Shout.

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Speaker 1: I love so many magazine it's really good. It's amazing. Roberts,

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Speaker 1: in the article was described as, quote, the sort of

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Speaker 1: businessman described in newspapers as prominent, but his was a

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Speaker 1: prominence earned by moving fast and not asking too many questions.

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Speaker 1: Move fast breaks down. So by eight seventy arnold goes

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Speaker 1: back to San Francisco. He's working at the diamond drill

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Speaker 1: company as an assistant bookkeeper. So he's mining adjacent right,

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Speaker 1: he's not actually out there in the field. James Cooper

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Speaker 1: also worked at the Diamond Drill Company and Arnold knew

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Speaker 1: him from earlier prospecting days. So Cooper teaches arnold about

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Speaker 1: diamonds and gems. Well, yeah, and they're just, you know,

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Speaker 1: they're working at the company together, yapping about diamonds. Now

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Speaker 1: it was allegedly cooper who first brought up the idea

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Speaker 1: of as salting a piece of land with gems. Do

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Speaker 1: you know what that means? I'm guess. So you gotta

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Speaker 1: pepper round, you're gonna salt it, sprinkle it, sprinkly, sprinkle me.

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Speaker 1: He didn't. He, Cooper didn't participate in the impending hoax,

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Speaker 1: but he's just like, you know, be really cool. You

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Speaker 1: guys being Super Fun for us to do. Just get

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Speaker 1: a bunch of the Earth Hannibal Styles. So there's this

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Speaker 1: book called diamonds in the Salt and it's written by

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Speaker 1: Bruce Woodard. He said that Cooper also gave Arnold a

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Speaker 1: starting collection of leftover gems from the shop. So he's

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Speaker 1: got he's got little scrappings, he's cut scrabblings from the

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Speaker 1: bottom of the bin. It's like how it like fried

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Speaker 1: chicken places they sell popcorn chicken, which is just the

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Speaker 1: stuff that fell off the regular chicken and the Fryer.

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Speaker 1: That's my dairy or like in a butcher's shop, like

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Speaker 1: the stuff that comes off the table gets turned into

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Speaker 1: hot dogs. He's got the hot dogs of gems. Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 1: So he's like, I'll give you all these scrabblings and Um,

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Speaker 1: enter John Slack, names, John Slack. Okay, Um, Cooper slack

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Speaker 1: and yeah, so one note to go back a little bit.

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Speaker 1: That this Dude Arnold, he likely purchased some of the

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Speaker 1: non diamonds, which would be like rubies, sapphires, etcetera, from

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Speaker 1: native Americans in Arizona. Okay, so they had more than like.

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Speaker 1: That's just supposition on People's part. Okay, okay. I was wondering,

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Speaker 1: do they have these emeralds down in the southwest? I mean,

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Speaker 1: I know they have, like you know, yeah, and I

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Speaker 1: don't know what if, like Arkansas, there's a lot in Arkansas.

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Speaker 1: There's all those places where you have the caverns. John

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Speaker 1: Slack so arnold needs help, so he brings in his cousin,

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Speaker 1: John Slack Action Slack Um. He was nine years older.

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Speaker 1: He's also from Kentucky, is his cousin, and he was

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Speaker 1: also a minor, forty niner. So cool if he was

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Speaker 1: nine years old from his nine year old cousin for

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Speaker 1: his tiny fingers to dig in the dirt. The idea, man,

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Speaker 1: it's so good. The plan. How could it fail? November eighteen,

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Speaker 1: Seventy Arnold and John Slack Um they go to George

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Speaker 1: Robert's office. The cousins are looking all weather beaten and

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Speaker 1: they said well, Hey, George, we got something really valuable.

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Speaker 1: They're like okay, Um, now it's too late in the

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Speaker 1: day to go deposit whatever they have at Bank of California.

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Speaker 1: So they're hoping that, Hey, can you store this for us?

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Speaker 1: We missed the bank is closed and it's just like

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Speaker 1: a bag. Can you store this for us, which, if

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Speaker 1: anyone comes to you and says can you hold this form, no,

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Speaker 1: the answer is no, especially if it's dripping especially if

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Speaker 1: it's dripping Um. So they're like, well, we got some

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Speaker 1: like rough diamonds, but we don't want to tell you

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Speaker 1: where we got them. We just have a bag of

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Speaker 1: rough diamonds. So, you know, Robert says, I'll store it

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Speaker 1: for you, and they said, please, don't tell anybody about this.

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Speaker 1: Is Their plan. Get him to tell one exactly. They

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Speaker 1: know that if you say don't tell anyone about this,

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Speaker 1: this man is going to turn around and tell everybody.

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Speaker 1: So what does he do? He Turns Around and he

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Speaker 1: tells William Ralston, the founder of Bank of California. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he's like, check it out, William, these dudes, these two

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Speaker 1: Ding Dong's, came in bag of diamonds. I'm holding onto it.

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Speaker 1: We got fresh marks in town. Who else does he tell?

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Speaker 1: As very harpending? Yeah, so Ralston is one of the

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Speaker 1: richest guys in California and he made his fortune mostly

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Speaker 1: from like the silver bananza in Nevada's comstockload. Yeah, that

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Speaker 1: was discovered in eighteen fifty nine Sara, Nevada's that's why

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Speaker 1: Nevada is called the silver state. That comstock looad kicked

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Speaker 1: off all the exploration for silver in Nevada. UTAH. That

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Speaker 1: cool weird town of Tonapon, Nevada exists because of the COMSTOCKLOAD.

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Speaker 1: A lot of the big names in the California gold

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Speaker 1: rush had a piece of this action too. Switched over. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so Roberts brings in more interested parties. He's not supposed

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Speaker 1: to be telling anyone. He tells all the big names.

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Speaker 1: He tells William Lent in general. George Dodge lent had

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Speaker 1: been a major investor in the comstock load. So this

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Speaker 1: group comes together and they want to buy the cousins out.

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Speaker 1: So they're they're doing exactly what the cousins thought. We

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Speaker 1: want to buy you out. They're like no, no, sorry,

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Speaker 1: these are our special loose diamonds. We're not going to

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Speaker 1: tell you where we got him. Slack, John Slack. He

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Speaker 1: he says, okay, I'll make you deal. Give me fifty

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Speaker 1: dollars now and then fifty dollars when we come back

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Speaker 1: to our from our next visit to the quote unquote field.

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Speaker 1: So he's like, acts like he's doing this side deal.

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Speaker 1: I want you to please, I'm begging you to keep

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Speaker 1: in mind that fifty dollars then is like one point

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Speaker 1: two million dollars now. So he goes to them and says,

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Speaker 1: give me one point too cool, and I'll come back

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Speaker 1: to you after I've gone and check the field and

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Speaker 1: make sure there's more diamonds out there worth it. And

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Speaker 1: this guy is like saying yeah, because I at the

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Speaker 1: inside angle, like I'm planning, I'm buying this. Wasn't it

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Speaker 1: for him? He's thinking that this, if they've located a

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Speaker 1: place where there's all this these rough diamonds, are going

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Speaker 1: to be able to open a diamond mine. And they're

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Speaker 1: thinking these guys are marks and they can make me

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Speaker 1: move over on them. They don't realize what they've had.

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Speaker 1: That okay with you. So July one that Arnold and

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Speaker 1: slack they decided to go to London to buy more

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Speaker 1: uncut gems, like London, London, London, London. So Arnold's calling

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Speaker 1: himself Ondo. They're taking steamships to go buy Lord. I

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Speaker 1: love this. They like flap their wings, and then slack

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Speaker 1: uses his middle name, bircham. So they use these aliases.

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Speaker 1: They buy twenty dollars with rough diamonds and rubies. So

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Speaker 1: they come back to California. They got sixty pounds pounds.

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Speaker 1: Legitimately they've I'm imagining they put them in a crate

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Speaker 1: like a chess and so it's like a cartoon. You

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Speaker 1: open it up and he's like yeah, although they're rough.

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Speaker 1: So it's like rocks Um. So they have the diamonds

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Speaker 1: and the rubies, sixty pounds. They smuggle them back in

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Speaker 1: and then they show Roberts and they're like, look what

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Speaker 1: we found in the field, sixty pounds. So they said, okay,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna go back. We're going back to the field

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Speaker 1: and they told the businessman we're going to bring you

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Speaker 1: back a couple of million dollars worth of stones. So

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Speaker 1: if they're talking millions, then think about the value. Now

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Speaker 1: that's where we are right now. So we have huge

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Speaker 1: crates of stones that everyone thinks is getting pulled out

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Speaker 1: of the earth somewhere in the West field, undisclosed location.

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Speaker 1: When we come back from this break, I'm gonna let

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Speaker 1: you know how that delivery of precious stones went. And

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Speaker 1: and we're back hey, our pants on. I still got

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Speaker 1: all my teeth when we left off Arnold and slack.

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Speaker 1: Remember those two? Uh, they'd promised George Roberts, a board

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Speaker 1: member of Kentucky Creep, Asbury Harpendings, Lincoln Gold Mining Company

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Speaker 1: Plaster County California. George Roberts slippery businessman. So he says

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Speaker 1: he's beat. He'll be quiet about the gems. Turns around

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Speaker 1: tells the President of the Bank of California, tells Asbury,

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Speaker 1: Arnold and slack. He basically goes back into the smoky

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Speaker 1: dark room and says, Hey, guys, I got a live one. Well,

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Speaker 1: they're all doing all sorts of other illicit deals and

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Speaker 1: the exploiting people and they're like, Oh, time out on

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Speaker 1: this exploitation. We've got another one coming in Arnold and slack.

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Speaker 1: They go to a remote spot in southern Wyoming. What

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Speaker 1: they've decided is the field and that's where they salt

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Speaker 1: the ground. So they have like they're like flower girls

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Speaker 1: at a wedding, just tossing like little like fabric petals

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Speaker 1: all over the ground. They were wearing little pinafores and

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Speaker 1: it was wild. SOTYO history, like Wyoming, abbreviated wyo history

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Speaker 1: dot org. Quote. Arnold and slack had salted the Mesa

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Speaker 1: which straddles the Wyoming Colorado border, about forty four miles

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Speaker 1: south of rock springs, Wyoming territory, with low grade diamonds

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Speaker 1: and other gemstones. To this day, the Mesa is officially

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Speaker 1: marked on US Geological Survey Topographic maps as diamond field.

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Speaker 1: I wonder if you could go out there and still

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Speaker 1: find a loose rock to they maybe, I mean if

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Speaker 1: they spread around wide enough. But yeah, so it's just Oh,

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Speaker 1: diamond field, that's where the diamonds are. So Arnold chose

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Speaker 1: the location because it was so remote and the weather

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Speaker 1: was so bad. No one's gonna want to go out there.

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Speaker 1: No one's gonna pop in, you know, just like I

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Speaker 1: was in the neighborhood, just a loot to check out

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Speaker 1: diamond field, taking a walk and with my dogs and

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Speaker 1: Oh my look, Dang kids get a pail. So they

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Speaker 1: even so right, they still don't want anyone tracking them.

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Speaker 1: So they keep the trail hidden by wrapping the horses

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Speaker 1: hoofs in Canvas and they wore moccasins. Damn, that's going

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Speaker 1: the extra mile. They don't want anyone. I've never heard

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Speaker 1: of anyone wrapping a horse's feet like that. I do

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Speaker 1: it all the time, but go to the store. I

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Speaker 1: don't want to know. That's commitment. Thank you. So back

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Speaker 1: in California, Um hardpending, Asbury harpending, he meets him at

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Speaker 1: the train station when they come back, and he said, quote,

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Speaker 1: both were travel stained and weather beaten men and had

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Speaker 1: the general appearance of having gone through much hardship and privation.

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Speaker 1: Slack was sound asleep, but, Arnold said, grimly erect, like

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Speaker 1: a vigilant old soldier with a rifle by his side.

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Speaker 1: Also a bulky looking buckskin package. So they come back

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Speaker 1: and they're like and see, like they're in character, like

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Speaker 1: you know, they're just lounging in the train. We're getting

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Speaker 1: close to the station, rumful up those one to three

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Speaker 1: sleep pretends. So in the package, in that bulky looking

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Speaker 1: buckskin package, large collection of diamonds. The cousins said they

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Speaker 1: had originally had two bundles but they lost the other

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Speaker 1: one crossing a river. So it's like, you think, this

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Speaker 1: is a lot more guys, much more of what a trip?

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Speaker 1: So way too many just to carry. I love how

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Speaker 1: they're playing these guys. Oh, they're amazing. So the Group

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Speaker 1: of investors, they decided to get the diamonds inspected by

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Speaker 1: a third party. You think they bring ten of the

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Speaker 1: gems that Arnold had given them to New York and

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Speaker 1: they head over and talked to none other than Charles Tiffany, damn,

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Speaker 1: founder of the eponymous tiffany. Go right to the top.

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Speaker 1: The New York meeting participants also included civil war generals

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Speaker 1: George McClellan and Benjaminer, the coward, George mcquean. That's what

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Speaker 1: he's doing. He got into the Emerald Business. So Benjamin Butler,

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Speaker 1: he's a US representative from Massachusetts. He was recommended as

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Speaker 1: someone who could help with issues regarding the land, like

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Speaker 1: I can grease those wheels, um. And then Horace Greeley coune.

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Speaker 1: He was there, but who knows why? Well, you know,

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Speaker 1: chrony is m he just liked to watch. So Um

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Speaker 1: tiffany praises the stones corruption. It's my cank. Tiffany appraises

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Speaker 1: the stones at a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which

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Speaker 1: is three point six million dollars today. Yeah, that's a lot,

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Speaker 1: that's a fair bit. And please remember, I'm begging you,

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Speaker 1: please remember, these are just ten percent of a collection

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Speaker 1: that had been purchased in London for dollars exactly. This

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Speaker 1: isn't incredible. It's quite the come up. So these New

300
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Speaker 1: York jewelers that they're having, like, is there any way

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Speaker 1: that they're in on this. No, they can't be. No,

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Speaker 1: they have no idea. That bad at their jobs completely

303
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Speaker 1: and they're rough. So it's not like I can tell

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Speaker 1: that these were cut somewhere or whatever. So, Um, it

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00:19:12,880 --> 00:19:16,439
Speaker 1: was later revealed because tiffany's expertise was in cut stones,

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Speaker 1: not in uncut ones. But still, I mean like it's

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Speaker 1: like if you're a farmer and you grow corn and

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Speaker 1: I bring you baby corn and you're like, oh, that

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00:19:25,040 --> 00:19:27,440
Speaker 1: looks just like corn. I mean like you've got to

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Speaker 1: be able to Parse a couple of these things. I

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Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know, but you know what act

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Speaker 1: like you know. That's what tiffany's up in there acting

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Speaker 1: like he knows. So the group values the most recent

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Speaker 1: bounty brought in at one point five million and then

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00:19:43,960 --> 00:19:47,840
Speaker 1: officially forms the San Francisco and New York mining and

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Speaker 1: commercial company when in doubt form a company. December eight

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Speaker 1: seventy one arnold goes back to London. It was like,

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Speaker 1: come on, I need somewhere. I'm good. Jumps Dude. He

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Speaker 1: spends there between eight thousand and thirty five thousand dollars

320
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Speaker 1: on uncut gems. We know how this is going. To

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Speaker 1: come right. I'm wondering, like there's obviously no communication between

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Speaker 1: London and New York. That's what surprising me is that

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00:20:12,520 --> 00:20:14,399
Speaker 1: they're not like they're going over there making a major

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00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:16,520
Speaker 1: purchase and they don't. None of this is filtering ring

325
00:20:16,640 --> 00:20:21,280
Speaker 1: back across the Atlantic. has either from just well still though,

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Speaker 1: a major purchase. I mean like the jewelers. You think

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Speaker 1: there'd be some like, you know, price change, like, oh,

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Speaker 1: we got a big plant. There's this whale in London constelling,

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Speaker 1: buying up jewels. Why don't they come to New York?

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Speaker 1: Who are they? Whatever? Good questions. And if they're Americans

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Speaker 1: going to London, the Brits would know that. Maybe they

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00:20:36,240 --> 00:20:38,919
Speaker 1: used fake accents. That would be amazing. Do you have

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00:20:38,920 --> 00:20:45,760
Speaker 1: any diamonds? And then people trying to speak French to

334
00:20:45,840 --> 00:20:52,160
Speaker 1: them and they all UM, okay. So they start this company,

335
00:20:52,400 --> 00:20:55,440
Speaker 1: legal paperworks in place. They decided to take their first

336
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Speaker 1: visit to the diamond field. I mean it makes sense.

337
00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:00,919
Speaker 1: You've now created this diamond field. So they hire a

338
00:21:01,040 --> 00:21:05,680
Speaker 1: well respected mining engineer named Henry Jannon to come along

339
00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:10,880
Speaker 1: for the ride. Hop in Henry Jannon, total protogists. Yeah,

340
00:21:11,160 --> 00:21:15,280
Speaker 1: he had inspected hundreds of minds really conservative in his

341
00:21:15,320 --> 00:21:18,919
Speaker 1: assessments as well. So he's like Hurst or like the

342
00:21:18,960 --> 00:21:22,520
Speaker 1: color talks to him. No, I think he's like science

343
00:21:22,560 --> 00:21:27,040
Speaker 1: guy and because he'd done all these conservative assessments so

344
00:21:27,080 --> 00:21:29,760
Speaker 1: that the owners would wind up getting way more than

345
00:21:29,800 --> 00:21:32,560
Speaker 1: a thought out of all of these minds. So it's

346
00:21:32,560 --> 00:21:33,959
Speaker 1: like a good guy to come in. He's not going

347
00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:38,040
Speaker 1: to overstate it. He's basically internationally known for being the

348
00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:41,920
Speaker 1: final boss of mine inspection. They bring in the final

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Speaker 1: boss Spring of Eighteen, Seventy two, Arnold John Slack, harpending, Asbury, Jannon,

350
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Speaker 1: a general dodge, and then a British acquaintance of harpending's

351
00:21:54,600 --> 00:21:58,639
Speaker 1: named Alfred rubery. They get together in St Louis and

352
00:21:58,680 --> 00:22:03,320
Speaker 1: they head on a train to Wyoming. Now, fun fact

353
00:22:04,280 --> 00:22:07,240
Speaker 1: Asbury and rubery they first met in the United States

354
00:22:07,359 --> 00:22:10,399
Speaker 1: during the civil war. Both were sympathetic to the south.

355
00:22:10,960 --> 00:22:14,479
Speaker 1: They outfitted a schooner in San Francisco Harvard to plunder

356
00:22:14,520 --> 00:22:21,920
Speaker 1: ships for the cause of confederacy. However, that went overwhelm

357
00:22:22,000 --> 00:22:24,360
Speaker 1: I bet the San Francisco whalers and gold ships are

358
00:22:24,400 --> 00:22:27,080
Speaker 1: just like, Oh yeah, come with it. So well, they

359
00:22:27,119 --> 00:22:29,440
Speaker 1: could both get arrested and convicted of trees. I was

360
00:22:29,480 --> 00:22:31,960
Speaker 1: going to say that did not last long. Harpending did

361
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Speaker 1: ten years. Well, he was sentenced to ten years in Alcatraz, damn,

362
00:22:36,040 --> 00:22:39,680
Speaker 1: and after four months he was released, though, because Lincoln

363
00:22:39,720 --> 00:22:42,639
Speaker 1: granted amnesty to all political prisoners who would agree to

364
00:22:42,720 --> 00:22:47,159
Speaker 1: take and keep the oath of allegiance. So rubery was

365
00:22:47,200 --> 00:22:50,480
Speaker 1: also sentenced to ten years, also pardoned. So he gets

366
00:22:50,480 --> 00:22:53,119
Speaker 1: by on the whole, mouth towards none. So here we have.

367
00:22:53,240 --> 00:22:57,520
Speaker 1: This is who we're dealing with here. Um Anyway, Arnold

368
00:22:57,600 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 1: and slack. They're about to head this group up to

369
00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:04,359
Speaker 1: this spot where they say that they've just been picking gems. Willing, Willy, Um,

370
00:23:04,400 --> 00:23:07,359
Speaker 1: they purposefully take the group on the super roundabout path

371
00:23:07,480 --> 00:23:11,760
Speaker 1: to the field, trying to confuse them about the exact location. Finally,

372
00:23:11,760 --> 00:23:15,480
Speaker 1: on June four, after four long days on horseback, they arrive.

373
00:23:16,080 --> 00:23:20,240
Speaker 1: The group they begin digging. They find gems almost immediately because, yeah,

374
00:23:20,240 --> 00:23:25,800
Speaker 1: there's like everywhere, harpending Asbury. Harpending later writes, quote, I

375
00:23:25,840 --> 00:23:28,040
Speaker 1: had not been on the ground three minutes before I

376
00:23:28,040 --> 00:23:33,040
Speaker 1: found a large diamond. I got off my horse. That

377
00:23:33,200 --> 00:23:37,960
Speaker 1: day we got over five hundred diamonds, rubies sapphires and emeralds.

378
00:23:38,040 --> 00:23:40,360
Speaker 1: Arnold would generally tell me where the best places were

379
00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:46,159
Speaker 1: to dig for the gems, the Easter egg where. This

380
00:23:46,240 --> 00:23:47,639
Speaker 1: is right in front of the cage, like, I don't know,

381
00:23:47,760 --> 00:23:52,520
Speaker 1: look under that room. So over the next few days

382
00:23:52,760 --> 00:23:58,760
Speaker 1: the group continues to look successfully surprised gems. Jannen, don't

383
00:23:58,800 --> 00:24:02,919
Speaker 1: forget final bosses. He surveyed three thousand acres, although the

384
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:06,679
Speaker 1: salted area was only like an acre. So he surveys it.

385
00:24:07,240 --> 00:24:09,840
Speaker 1: They head back to San Francisco. They left slack and

386
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:15,160
Speaker 1: rubery to guard the grounds. Right unknown reasons, who knows

387
00:24:15,560 --> 00:24:18,359
Speaker 1: those two? They bail out after a few days. The

388
00:24:18,400 --> 00:24:22,440
Speaker 1: ones guarding it. Slack, he had been paid his hundred thousand.

389
00:24:22,520 --> 00:24:25,040
Speaker 1: Remember the fifty and then fifty. He was never seen

390
00:24:25,080 --> 00:24:29,480
Speaker 1: by the group again. So smart he's like, I think

391
00:24:29,680 --> 00:24:32,720
Speaker 1: I've gotten as much as I can. I'm going to

392
00:24:32,800 --> 00:24:39,080
Speaker 1: tap out now. So Jannon, though, he submits a report

393
00:24:39,080 --> 00:24:42,600
Speaker 1: of his findings to the group. He estimates the value

394
00:24:42,600 --> 00:24:47,160
Speaker 1: of the company's stock at around forty dollars share and

395
00:24:47,240 --> 00:24:51,960
Speaker 1: the property at least four million. Right. So, as part

396
00:24:52,000 --> 00:24:55,399
Speaker 1: of his deal, Jannen, who just assessed the value of

397
00:24:55,400 --> 00:24:59,320
Speaker 1: the stock, he purchases a thousand shares at ten dollars each.

398
00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:01,280
Speaker 1: He's saying that the shares or forty, but they're going

399
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:03,199
Speaker 1: to let him buy a thousand at ten. Yeah, so

400
00:25:03,240 --> 00:25:05,280
Speaker 1: this is his like payback from the group. It's like

401
00:25:05,359 --> 00:25:07,000
Speaker 1: he gets in on the ground and then he sells him.

402
00:25:07,040 --> 00:25:09,840
Speaker 1: He later sells him. He gets around thirty grand and

403
00:25:10,040 --> 00:25:15,480
Speaker 1: becomes the only non swindler to profit from this scam. Oh,

404
00:25:15,520 --> 00:25:18,520
Speaker 1: I'm glad the honest man made an honest profit. Everyone

405
00:25:18,680 --> 00:25:23,119
Speaker 1: was sure that this diamond field was legit. We know better, Saron,

406
00:25:23,880 --> 00:25:29,000
Speaker 1: do we ever? Yea. So let's listen to some ads.

407
00:25:29,200 --> 00:25:31,560
Speaker 1: Just hear him out, okay, just listen to him and

408
00:25:31,560 --> 00:25:33,359
Speaker 1: when we get back I'm going to tell you what

409
00:25:33,440 --> 00:25:36,199
Speaker 1: happened when it's discovered that a gem rich field in

410
00:25:36,200 --> 00:25:38,960
Speaker 1: the middle of nowhere is in fact to legit to

411
00:25:39,040 --> 00:26:07,959
Speaker 1: quite well, hello, Hey, I'm back. Hey, where was I? Ah, yes, French, yes, okay.

412
00:26:08,000 --> 00:26:12,000
Speaker 1: So it was decided, based on an assessment by legendary

413
00:26:12,080 --> 00:26:16,959
Speaker 1: mining engineer Henry Jannon, that the field was indeed swollen

414
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:21,560
Speaker 1: with gems, just like a tick, and everything was on

415
00:26:21,600 --> 00:26:23,720
Speaker 1: the up and up. I mean, I was just kind

416
00:26:23,720 --> 00:26:26,040
Speaker 1: of surprised Jannon went for the like. You know, if

417
00:26:26,080 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 1: he knows this industry, he knows how rocks are, he

418
00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:31,359
Speaker 1: knows like where you're gonna find gem fields. When you

419
00:26:31,400 --> 00:26:33,720
Speaker 1: go out and you find like diamonds three inches into

420
00:26:33,720 --> 00:26:36,359
Speaker 1: the dirt or maybe just sitting there, lightly custed but

421
00:26:36,560 --> 00:26:38,680
Speaker 1: covered with dust, you have to be like, this is

422
00:26:38,720 --> 00:26:42,000
Speaker 1: not normal. We didn't have to like get out axes

423
00:26:42,040 --> 00:26:45,280
Speaker 1: and cut into yeah, like, where's my Rock Hammer? What Thee?

424
00:26:45,520 --> 00:26:48,879
Speaker 1: Where are the children I can send down this hole? Um?

425
00:26:48,960 --> 00:26:53,119
Speaker 1: So remember Jann and he says the stock in the

426
00:26:53,119 --> 00:26:55,560
Speaker 1: company's worth forty is share and then he buys it

427
00:26:55,600 --> 00:26:59,400
Speaker 1: at ten. Arnold was paid hundred and fifty thousand dollars

428
00:26:59,400 --> 00:27:02,119
Speaker 1: for his fine and then he also got three hundred

429
00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:06,600
Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of stock right which he sold off.

430
00:27:06,640 --> 00:27:09,400
Speaker 1: He sells it to Asbury. In all he makes about

431
00:27:09,480 --> 00:27:13,720
Speaker 1: five hundred fifty thousand dollars. Take away the thirty five

432
00:27:13,800 --> 00:27:16,800
Speaker 1: or to fifty he spent on gems in London. So

433
00:27:17,600 --> 00:27:20,840
Speaker 1: he makes five and fifty thousand dollars in eighteen seventy

434
00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:24,800
Speaker 1: two is something like thirteen point three million dollars today. Damn.

435
00:27:24,920 --> 00:27:30,399
Speaker 1: That's liked by this point the news of the find

436
00:27:30,560 --> 00:27:34,119
Speaker 1: and Jannon's report becomes public. No one knows where the

437
00:27:34,200 --> 00:27:38,960
Speaker 1: land is still and although many tried unsuccessfully to guess

438
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:41,600
Speaker 1: its location and send their own parties out there to look.

439
00:27:41,880 --> 00:27:44,639
Speaker 1: So people are sneaking around. In the fall of eighteen

440
00:27:44,680 --> 00:27:47,480
Speaker 1: seventy two men from the San Francisco and New York

441
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:51,280
Speaker 1: mining and commercial company and Jann and they made another

442
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:54,360
Speaker 1: trip to Wyoming to try and secure the land. Hie

443
00:27:54,400 --> 00:27:56,920
Speaker 1: Up loose ends and then they purchased this land. Yet

444
00:27:57,200 --> 00:28:01,040
Speaker 1: I don't think so. Okay, Arnold sides not to join them.

445
00:28:01,080 --> 00:28:04,600
Speaker 1: He's like you guys, go ahead. He's already moved back

446
00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:07,400
Speaker 1: to Kentucky. At this point he's like, you know, I'm

447
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:10,240
Speaker 1: going home. On the train back to the bay area,

448
00:28:10,960 --> 00:28:16,160
Speaker 1: Jannon runs into two geologists, Samuel Emmons and James Gardner.

449
00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:20,959
Speaker 1: Now those who worked for Clarence King, a recognized geologist

450
00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:25,119
Speaker 1: who some years before had persuaded the US government to

451
00:28:25,160 --> 00:28:27,720
Speaker 1: fund a survey of the land between the rockies and

452
00:28:27,760 --> 00:28:31,639
Speaker 1: the SIERRAS. So this guy, he's got the government looking

453
00:28:31,680 --> 00:28:35,000
Speaker 1: at stuff. He and his team, including Emmans and Gardner,

454
00:28:35,119 --> 00:28:38,400
Speaker 1: surveyed the fifty miles on either side of the parallel.

455
00:28:38,840 --> 00:28:43,440
Speaker 1: So they know this area. They are, you know, they're

456
00:28:43,480 --> 00:28:46,360
Speaker 1: like the final final bosses. They're quite intimate. This is

457
00:28:46,560 --> 00:28:49,640
Speaker 1: like the back of their hand. So emmans and gardener right.

458
00:28:49,680 --> 00:28:52,400
Speaker 1: They suspect that Jannon and his crew are coming from

459
00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:55,560
Speaker 1: the mysterious gem field that everyone's been talking about and

460
00:28:55,560 --> 00:28:57,880
Speaker 1: they wondered if the field was near the land that

461
00:28:57,960 --> 00:29:00,640
Speaker 1: they surveyed. So they asked the group like kind of,

462
00:29:00,680 --> 00:29:03,960
Speaker 1: you know, innocent, innocuous questions. So where are you coming from?

463
00:29:05,000 --> 00:29:07,360
Speaker 1: What did you do there? What longitude and latitude of

464
00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:08,920
Speaker 1: you guys coming from? What was the quality of the

465
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:11,320
Speaker 1: dirt where you were hanging out? Um, and they're able

466
00:29:11,360 --> 00:29:13,280
Speaker 1: to figure out where the field is based on all

467
00:29:13,320 --> 00:29:16,440
Speaker 1: their secret questions. So then they go back and they

468
00:29:16,480 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 1: tell Clarence King, the geologist, final final boss, about this

469
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:24,960
Speaker 1: encounter they had on the train. King says, you know what,

470
00:29:25,040 --> 00:29:27,760
Speaker 1: let's go look for ourselves. I think I can find

471
00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:31,160
Speaker 1: the land. I want to corroborate Jannon's findings, just, you know,

472
00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 1: academic expertise. A big discovery, but I mean, if you

473
00:29:36,400 --> 00:29:38,920
Speaker 1: think about it, this is a revolutionary thing that there's

474
00:29:38,960 --> 00:29:43,880
Speaker 1: this incredible not just diamonds but rubies and Sapphire, everything

475
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:46,320
Speaker 1: you can imagine. Just he's like, I want to see this.

476
00:29:47,040 --> 00:29:50,240
Speaker 1: Native population had noticed it in the thousands. They had

477
00:29:50,280 --> 00:29:52,960
Speaker 1: been there. But you know, you know as you do.

478
00:29:53,400 --> 00:29:56,960
Speaker 1: So the group sets out right. They didn't tell anybody

479
00:29:57,000 --> 00:30:00,520
Speaker 1: else about the real purpose of their trip and instead

480
00:30:00,560 --> 00:30:02,320
Speaker 1: they were telling people that they were going to look

481
00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:08,280
Speaker 1: for carboniferous fossils instead of diamonds. That's one of the

482
00:30:08,320 --> 00:30:11,600
Speaker 1: scientific non laws. So they get to Wyoming, they get

483
00:30:11,600 --> 00:30:14,600
Speaker 1: off the train. They continued on for a few days.

484
00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 1: They find the site. Zaren, I want you to close

485
00:30:19,200 --> 00:30:22,000
Speaker 1: your eyes. I was wondering my eyes over here permanently

486
00:30:22,040 --> 00:30:26,000
Speaker 1: open and stuff. Okay, one second. Are Closed. I want

487
00:30:26,000 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 1: you to picture it. Yes, the three geologists, Samuel Emmons,

488
00:30:32,960 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 1: James Gardner and their boss, Clarence King, stand in Rock Springs,

489
00:30:38,080 --> 00:30:42,160
Speaker 1: Wyoming territory. They've stepped off the train and have secured

490
00:30:42,200 --> 00:30:46,480
Speaker 1: horses for their forty odd mile trip into the desolate distance.

491
00:30:48,200 --> 00:30:52,840
Speaker 1: The Sky is so incredibly vast. Above and before them,

492
00:30:52,880 --> 00:30:56,160
Speaker 1: the hills are like a mustard gold velvet, the shrubs

493
00:30:56,160 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 1: and grasses all crisping in the fall air, just waiting

494
00:30:59,360 --> 00:31:02,600
Speaker 1: for that cold ight of winter. The wind howls around

495
00:31:02,600 --> 00:31:06,320
Speaker 1: them as they set off dust swirls. They consult the

496
00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:09,200
Speaker 1: rough map they've drawn up of the approximate location of

497
00:31:09,240 --> 00:31:12,560
Speaker 1: this so called gem field. After a number of days,

498
00:31:12,840 --> 00:31:16,320
Speaker 1: they locate the spot. They tie up their horses, they

499
00:31:16,320 --> 00:31:20,160
Speaker 1: get out their equipment, they begin their search. This is

500
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:24,600
Speaker 1: a most American moment, people looking at a barren, deserted

501
00:31:24,760 --> 00:31:29,000
Speaker 1: or silently empty landscape before them, hoping beyond hope to

502
00:31:29,080 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 1: find fortune where others would just walk on by. But

503
00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:34,840
Speaker 1: these guys are part of a most modern American moment.

504
00:31:35,600 --> 00:31:39,880
Speaker 1: They are the cynics, they're the specialists who want information

505
00:31:39,960 --> 00:31:43,800
Speaker 1: confirmed before they'll believe anything, and these are, unfortunately, the

506
00:31:43,920 --> 00:31:49,520
Speaker 1: very rare Americans. So one of the men stoops over,

507
00:31:49,640 --> 00:31:53,200
Speaker 1: scraping away at this arid soil. He finds gems. The

508
00:31:53,280 --> 00:31:56,959
Speaker 1: other men dig they find the same gems. It seems

509
00:31:56,960 --> 00:31:59,560
Speaker 1: to them that these came right from the ground beneath them,

510
00:31:59,640 --> 00:32:03,680
Speaker 1: the product of Wild Wyoming. They were thrilled, they were surprised.

511
00:32:04,080 --> 00:32:06,800
Speaker 1: They logged their fines into the evening and they bedded

512
00:32:06,840 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 1: down for the night. I can only imagine that the

513
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:12,640
Speaker 1: sky above them, so clear on an autumn evening, was

514
00:32:12,720 --> 00:32:15,719
Speaker 1: just thick with stars, the Milky Way Tucking him in

515
00:32:15,760 --> 00:32:18,520
Speaker 1: the endless night full of diamonds reflecting back to the

516
00:32:18,600 --> 00:32:23,880
Speaker 1: riches that slept underneath them in the dirt. However, looking

517
00:32:23,920 --> 00:32:27,120
Speaker 1: more carefully the next morning, they realized there's kind of

518
00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:31,320
Speaker 1: a pattern to how these gems are distributed. For example,

519
00:32:31,560 --> 00:32:34,800
Speaker 1: this is my favorite. King found a diamond, quote perched

520
00:32:34,800 --> 00:32:39,360
Speaker 1: precariously under a slender rock. So like tossed a diamond

521
00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:41,200
Speaker 1: on the ground that set a rock on top of it.

522
00:32:41,440 --> 00:32:46,880
Speaker 1: Like ya trying to catch a mouse with a diamond,

523
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:51,080
Speaker 1: you put a little rock. Yes, so they're like how,

524
00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:54,560
Speaker 1: how could this have been like this for hundreds, nay thousands,

525
00:32:54,600 --> 00:32:58,160
Speaker 1: of years? A scientific mystery. And there also seemed to

526
00:32:58,200 --> 00:33:01,320
Speaker 1: be sort of a uniform ratio of one diamond found

527
00:33:01,520 --> 00:33:04,200
Speaker 1: with around a dozen rubies. Yes, are also what I

528
00:33:04,200 --> 00:33:06,600
Speaker 1: imagine is that there is a pathway if you follow it,

529
00:33:06,640 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 1: and they kind of are cast from that pathway side. Um,

530
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:15,280
Speaker 1: they also found gems in ant hills, but they were

531
00:33:15,320 --> 00:33:18,400
Speaker 1: only in the ant hills that had footprints, are disturbed

532
00:33:18,400 --> 00:33:23,920
Speaker 1: dirt near them. So all this dangerous? Well, first of all,

533
00:33:23,920 --> 00:33:25,480
Speaker 1: why would there be in the middle of an ant

534
00:33:25,520 --> 00:33:29,520
Speaker 1: hill wouldn't the ant hill is unearthed. They would move

535
00:33:29,680 --> 00:33:32,120
Speaker 1: the earth around. Yeah, that's part of the earth they'd

536
00:33:32,160 --> 00:33:36,400
Speaker 1: be kicking out anyway. Um, so the geologists they go

537
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:39,920
Speaker 1: further afield. They dig holes where diamonds should be based

538
00:33:39,920 --> 00:33:42,200
Speaker 1: on what they've been seeing. But the earth is clearly

539
00:33:42,280 --> 00:33:46,800
Speaker 1: undisturbed and they found no diamonds. That's all. So king

540
00:33:46,880 --> 00:33:51,320
Speaker 1: concluded quote summing up the minerals. This rock has produced

541
00:33:51,440 --> 00:33:57,600
Speaker 1: four distinct types of diamond, a few oriental rubies, garnets, spinels, sapphires,

542
00:33:57,640 --> 00:34:02,080
Speaker 1: emeralds and Amethysts, an association enough minerals of impossible occurrence

543
00:34:02,120 --> 00:34:05,520
Speaker 1: in nature, and some mimerals that are only found in India,

544
00:34:05,720 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 1: some others only found in Iran. It's very curious. It

545
00:34:08,600 --> 00:34:11,799
Speaker 1: is fascinating. So a few days into their work, a

546
00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:16,160
Speaker 1: man on horseback approaches them. He introduces himself as JF

547
00:34:16,200 --> 00:34:19,319
Speaker 1: Berry from New York City. He'd followed them there and

548
00:34:19,400 --> 00:34:25,719
Speaker 1: been watching them. Creepy the whole time. He's like hiding,

549
00:34:26,960 --> 00:34:29,640
Speaker 1: he's like so he says like hey, you guys found gems.

550
00:34:30,640 --> 00:34:33,560
Speaker 1: Creepy one of them. Let slip that the site is

551
00:34:33,560 --> 00:34:36,239
Speaker 1: a hoax. He's exhausted, he's been digging in ant hills.

552
00:34:36,239 --> 00:34:38,600
Speaker 1: He's like yeah, we found gems and it's all garbage.

553
00:34:38,640 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 1: He's nursing his hand blisters. So then, but then they're

554
00:34:42,040 --> 00:34:43,759
Speaker 1: like they get worried that the news is going to

555
00:34:43,840 --> 00:34:46,240
Speaker 1: blow the whole thing wide open and put their colleagues

556
00:34:46,280 --> 00:34:49,359
Speaker 1: at risk. So the geologists they high tail it back

557
00:34:49,400 --> 00:34:51,840
Speaker 1: to San Francisco so that they can tell the mining

558
00:34:51,840 --> 00:34:57,080
Speaker 1: and commercial company what they've discovered. More November, seventy two

559
00:34:57,120 --> 00:35:01,400
Speaker 1: they arrived in San Francisco. Now K out of respect,

560
00:35:01,480 --> 00:35:04,200
Speaker 1: first goes to Jannon, not the company. I like that

561
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:08,240
Speaker 1: night things that in terms of like respect for your colleague.

562
00:35:08,280 --> 00:35:10,640
Speaker 1: That's done because he knows this is going to ruin you.

563
00:35:10,719 --> 00:35:12,480
Speaker 1: Many like man, you may want to go to India

564
00:35:13,239 --> 00:35:16,160
Speaker 1: look for the gems there. So Jannon, at first he

565
00:35:16,239 --> 00:35:19,400
Speaker 1: stands by his findings and he's like no, I you

566
00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:21,279
Speaker 1: know this is I know what I saw. So then

567
00:35:21,320 --> 00:35:24,920
Speaker 1: they talk all night and finally Jannon accepts like he

568
00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:28,840
Speaker 1: was duped. That's got to be hard. You know, people

569
00:35:28,920 --> 00:35:32,000
Speaker 1: get really tired. It's really hard for most people to

570
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:36,040
Speaker 1: admit mistakes or admit they don't know. It's also really

571
00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:40,160
Speaker 1: hard to use reason and rationality to correct emotions. Those

572
00:35:40,160 --> 00:35:42,360
Speaker 1: are two different languages, so you can't use one to

573
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:45,120
Speaker 1: usually correct the other. You can use belief to correct emotion,

574
00:35:45,160 --> 00:35:47,440
Speaker 1: but you usually can't use fact to correct emotions. If

575
00:35:47,440 --> 00:35:50,360
Speaker 1: he's committed himself to it, he will not be swayed. No,

576
00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:52,520
Speaker 1: and I think that's like, that's a really hard moment.

577
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:54,520
Speaker 1: I could see how it takes all night to bring

578
00:35:54,600 --> 00:35:58,399
Speaker 1: him to that point. Um So, the next morning, King

579
00:35:58,480 --> 00:36:00,960
Speaker 1: and Jannon, they go to the mine and commercial company

580
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:04,600
Speaker 1: directors and they tell them you have been victims of fraud.

581
00:36:05,040 --> 00:36:07,799
Speaker 1: I hate to break it to you. The directors asked

582
00:36:07,920 --> 00:36:10,400
Speaker 1: King the geologists to take a few of them out

583
00:36:10,440 --> 00:36:13,359
Speaker 1: there with Jannin. Go out to the field they go.

584
00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:17,000
Speaker 1: Now they're seeing it all with new eyes. They have

585
00:36:17,040 --> 00:36:19,040
Speaker 1: all this new information. They're like, Oh my God, how

586
00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:21,839
Speaker 1: do we not this is totally a hoax, as there's

587
00:36:21,880 --> 00:36:28,560
Speaker 1: like one gem perched on top of it's in a

588
00:36:28,640 --> 00:36:31,200
Speaker 1: plastic Easter, like, how did this get out her? We

589
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:35,360
Speaker 1: don't have plastic yet. Um So, the newly hired general

590
00:36:35,400 --> 00:36:38,600
Speaker 1: manager of the company said he saw ruby scattered in

591
00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:41,919
Speaker 1: such a way that, quote, it would have been impossible

592
00:36:41,960 --> 00:36:44,520
Speaker 1: for nature to have deposited them. As for a person

593
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:47,319
Speaker 1: standing in San Francisco to toss a marble in the

594
00:36:47,360 --> 00:36:52,680
Speaker 1: air and have it fall on the Bunker Hill monument right,

595
00:36:52,719 --> 00:36:56,439
Speaker 1: he's painting a beautiful picture. So the directors like, raise

596
00:36:56,480 --> 00:36:58,960
Speaker 1: your hand if you want to dissolve the company. All

597
00:36:59,080 --> 00:37:01,799
Speaker 1: the hands went up. Some people raised two hands and

598
00:37:01,920 --> 00:37:04,960
Speaker 1: a foot. So Arnold and slack they get indicted for

599
00:37:05,040 --> 00:37:08,080
Speaker 1: fraud by a grand jury. Case never goes to trial.

600
00:37:08,239 --> 00:37:11,560
Speaker 1: They indicted in mcentia but they never went to trial.

601
00:37:12,520 --> 00:37:15,400
Speaker 1: Arnold gets sued by William lent remember, he was the

602
00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:17,839
Speaker 1: big investor in the comstock load, the big money man.

603
00:37:17,960 --> 00:37:19,880
Speaker 1: They settled out of court for a hundred and fifty

604
00:37:19,880 --> 00:37:24,600
Speaker 1: thousand dollars, though he said Um he paid. Arnold says

605
00:37:24,640 --> 00:37:26,960
Speaker 1: he paid not because he was guilty but because the

606
00:37:27,040 --> 00:37:29,239
Speaker 1: lawsuit was time consuming and he wanted to move on

607
00:37:29,280 --> 00:37:31,680
Speaker 1: with his life and he was tired of the Pinkerton's harassing.

608
00:37:31,960 --> 00:37:38,400
Speaker 1: He's like here's your one fifty boring A. I'm onto

609
00:37:38,560 --> 00:37:42,560
Speaker 1: greener pastors. You guys. Back in Kentucky Arnold had bought

610
00:37:42,560 --> 00:37:45,320
Speaker 1: a house, obviously from the money he made the hoax.

611
00:37:45,680 --> 00:37:51,400
Speaker 1: The House had marble fireplaces, had really crazy, chandeliers, high ceilings,

612
00:37:51,760 --> 00:37:56,480
Speaker 1: beautiful wallpapers, always very nice, good touch. To this day

613
00:37:56,520 --> 00:37:58,479
Speaker 1: there are locals who are convinced that there are still

614
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:01,800
Speaker 1: diamonds buried in the basement a house. Such a typical

615
00:38:01,880 --> 00:38:04,880
Speaker 1: local Lord exactly. You know, there are kids who like

616
00:38:05,239 --> 00:38:08,759
Speaker 1: stare from the bushes of the he also bought five

617
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:12,120
Speaker 1: acres in his wife's name where he bred thoroughbred horses

618
00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:14,920
Speaker 1: and he raised sheep. There's a real wealth in this story.

619
00:38:15,360 --> 00:38:18,799
Speaker 1: We know about the Horse Trade. There he invested in

620
00:38:18,840 --> 00:38:22,839
Speaker 1: real estate, became a banker. He became what he was

621
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:25,960
Speaker 1: trying to take down. Um in the spring of eighteen

622
00:38:26,040 --> 00:38:29,719
Speaker 1: seventy eight, he was in dispute with another banker, but

623
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:34,240
Speaker 1: that banker had insulted Arnold in a letter, doubting his trust,

624
00:38:34,360 --> 00:38:37,720
Speaker 1: trustworthiness because of the possible involvement in the diamond hoax.

625
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:41,560
Speaker 1: There was a shootout and Arnold was hit in the shoulder.

626
00:38:41,960 --> 00:38:44,600
Speaker 1: It did not kill him, but in the winter of

627
00:38:44,600 --> 00:38:47,160
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy nine he caught pneumonia and he died in

628
00:38:47,160 --> 00:38:49,880
Speaker 1: the hospital in February eight. So was that like a

629
00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:55,399
Speaker 1: Kentucky Colonel Duel like so I write in a letter.

630
00:38:55,840 --> 00:38:58,440
Speaker 1: So you insulted me and I think you're a fraud,

631
00:38:58,680 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 1: and drop a white glove and you smell like dukie

632
00:39:01,760 --> 00:39:06,000
Speaker 1: and he's like, well, I never and then so what

633
00:39:06,120 --> 00:39:10,600
Speaker 1: about slack? What about John? After abandoning his duty guarding

634
00:39:10,640 --> 00:39:14,360
Speaker 1: the field, slack went to St Louis. He worked. What

635
00:39:14,440 --> 00:39:17,239
Speaker 1: would you do if you had the money that he had?

636
00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:21,040
Speaker 1: You bailed out on guarding the supposed diamond field. You

637
00:39:21,040 --> 00:39:24,800
Speaker 1: go to St Louis. What would you do? M Go

638
00:39:24,960 --> 00:39:30,080
Speaker 1: to St Louis late eighteen hundreds by a stockyard. He

639
00:39:30,160 --> 00:39:33,600
Speaker 1: worked as a carpenter at a coffin company. What not

640
00:39:33,840 --> 00:39:37,640
Speaker 1: in my top one choices. And then he eventually became

641
00:39:37,680 --> 00:39:41,040
Speaker 1: president there he worked his wing did I'm not kidding.

642
00:39:41,600 --> 00:39:44,279
Speaker 1: Then he goes to New Mexico and the job he

643
00:39:44,320 --> 00:39:47,040
Speaker 1: had in New Mexico was adjacent. He became an undertaker.

644
00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:49,600
Speaker 1: Now he didn't get into the Topaz business. No, he

645
00:39:49,719 --> 00:39:52,560
Speaker 1: became an undertaker. He died in eighteen ninety six, at

646
00:39:52,600 --> 00:39:56,759
Speaker 1: the age of seventy six. So Arnold pretty much pulled

647
00:39:56,800 --> 00:39:59,520
Speaker 1: it off. Slack would have too, but he cut and

648
00:39:59,600 --> 00:40:02,160
Speaker 1: ran and wound up doing a lot of death work.

649
00:40:03,400 --> 00:40:06,600
Speaker 1: He still had a little bit that Szaren, what is

650
00:40:06,600 --> 00:40:11,120
Speaker 1: your ridiculous takeaway here, Oh man, Um, one that rich

651
00:40:11,160 --> 00:40:13,479
Speaker 1: people are easy to scam, especially if you can tell

652
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:16,120
Speaker 1: them that you're dumb. You know, I just don't know

653
00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:18,799
Speaker 1: these things, but a big, strong, strap and gentleman such

654
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,359
Speaker 1: as yourself, you probably could. You know, like you play

655
00:40:21,440 --> 00:40:24,920
Speaker 1: that up, but like, in terms of finances, I think

656
00:40:24,920 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 1: they're gonna go. They'RE gonna go for it, and this

657
00:40:26,600 --> 00:40:30,120
Speaker 1: apparently has been true for aons. I mean, you can

658
00:40:30,160 --> 00:40:32,600
Speaker 1: just goes back. You know, this is exactly the thing

659
00:40:33,040 --> 00:40:35,520
Speaker 1: that we saw in the DOT com boom. This was

660
00:40:35,560 --> 00:40:37,680
Speaker 1: the thing that you see in real estate scams. Is

661
00:40:37,719 --> 00:40:40,319
Speaker 1: the thing you saw in l a, the Owens Valley River,

662
00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:42,279
Speaker 1: I mean like everywhere you go you will see this,

663
00:40:42,400 --> 00:40:44,880
Speaker 1: like somebody comes along necks like, I just don't know

664
00:40:44,920 --> 00:40:46,640
Speaker 1: what to do, and then they scam these rich people

665
00:40:46,680 --> 00:40:49,000
Speaker 1: who are so certain. So usually, I mean it's the

666
00:40:49,120 --> 00:40:52,399
Speaker 1: it's the traditional act of the confidence artists. They work

667
00:40:52,480 --> 00:40:56,799
Speaker 1: on your confidence. So it's it's a flawless scheme. I'm

668
00:40:56,840 --> 00:41:00,160
Speaker 1: just so surprised that these people who, you know, they

669
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:02,840
Speaker 1: know money, they know wealth, but they don't know anything

670
00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:06,040
Speaker 1: about jewels or gems and they don't stop to think.

671
00:41:06,360 --> 00:41:08,239
Speaker 1: So I'm just struck by how many times they had

672
00:41:08,239 --> 00:41:10,200
Speaker 1: to go out there with experts before they could actually

673
00:41:10,239 --> 00:41:12,200
Speaker 1: see the truth, because they're so convinced by what they

674
00:41:12,239 --> 00:41:14,640
Speaker 1: wanted to believe. But they think they're pulling a scam

675
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:16,920
Speaker 1: to what I'm saying. So they're like, oh, we're getting

676
00:41:16,920 --> 00:41:18,960
Speaker 1: one over on them. So they're so busy thinking about

677
00:41:18,960 --> 00:41:20,920
Speaker 1: the scam that they don't actually check their own beliefs.

678
00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:23,279
Speaker 1: Their scam is based on a faulty belief, but there's

679
00:41:23,280 --> 00:41:25,480
Speaker 1: nobody looking at the greed that they don't check that.

680
00:41:25,560 --> 00:41:27,719
Speaker 1: I'm like that's the parts. That's ridiculous. I'm like, come

681
00:41:27,719 --> 00:41:31,040
Speaker 1: on now, how did you get wealthy? Right, well, I

682
00:41:31,040 --> 00:41:33,840
Speaker 1: said it earlier about that being the most American moment.

683
00:41:34,360 --> 00:41:36,759
Speaker 1: You know, when Americans are at their best, at their

684
00:41:36,800 --> 00:41:41,520
Speaker 1: most sort of Whitman esque, they see possibility everywhere. They're

685
00:41:41,560 --> 00:41:46,359
Speaker 1: expansive in thought, they're curious, adventurous. Yeah, they don't get

686
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:50,239
Speaker 1: sidetracked by the like base animal tribalism of wanting to

687
00:41:50,280 --> 00:41:52,440
Speaker 1: just be with people that look and think and sound

688
00:41:52,480 --> 00:41:54,279
Speaker 1: and believe like they do right or do things in

689
00:41:54,320 --> 00:41:57,640
Speaker 1: the old way. Yeah, they're open, they're eager. Life is vast,

690
00:41:57,719 --> 00:42:01,520
Speaker 1: it's exciting, it's full of possibility. That's the America, that's

691
00:42:01,560 --> 00:42:06,919
Speaker 1: the dream America, the sort of fiction. So in this

692
00:42:06,960 --> 00:42:09,720
Speaker 1: story we have like the sad underbelly of that moment.

693
00:42:09,760 --> 00:42:13,040
Speaker 1: That's the one driven by greed. I I like Arnold

694
00:42:13,080 --> 00:42:17,000
Speaker 1: and slack, right. So they used the big wigs greed

695
00:42:17,120 --> 00:42:21,120
Speaker 1: against them, the bank owners, the mining magnets. They're so

696
00:42:21,200 --> 00:42:25,320
Speaker 1: eager to get money off the backs of individual miners,

697
00:42:26,160 --> 00:42:28,239
Speaker 1: just like they've been doing. It's what made them so

698
00:42:28,480 --> 00:42:31,200
Speaker 1: unbelievably wealthy. I mean, like it is so hard to

699
00:42:31,239 --> 00:42:35,360
Speaker 1: comprehend how much money these guys got, all the like

700
00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:40,360
Speaker 1: the big four, all the railroad barons, everything, like you

701
00:42:40,440 --> 00:42:43,560
Speaker 1: talked about that with old billy minor, the train robber. Right.

702
00:42:43,800 --> 00:42:47,280
Speaker 1: So the fat cats in this case, they didn't think critically,

703
00:42:47,280 --> 00:42:50,279
Speaker 1: like you said. They never asked. They thought greedily and

704
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:53,239
Speaker 1: then they acted in haste because they're so quick to

705
00:42:53,280 --> 00:42:55,399
Speaker 1: take advantage of Arnold and slack and, as I used

706
00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:57,440
Speaker 1: to exploiting people, and they see someone and they go

707
00:42:57,600 --> 00:43:01,560
Speaker 1: a quick read. It's like, Oh, we can exploit this person. Yeah, well, surprise.

708
00:43:02,320 --> 00:43:06,000
Speaker 1: So once again I'm not being too critical the criminals

709
00:43:06,080 --> 00:43:09,520
Speaker 1: here at all. No one was hurt or killed. Are

710
00:43:09,600 --> 00:43:12,719
Speaker 1: My favorite. They just lightened the pockets some fat cat

711
00:43:14,000 --> 00:43:18,040
Speaker 1: and then the cool scientists cracked the case, that they

712
00:43:18,080 --> 00:43:19,640
Speaker 1: got out there and actually like, Oh hey, let's just

713
00:43:19,680 --> 00:43:21,920
Speaker 1: go walk this and see what we find. Yeah, and

714
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:24,359
Speaker 1: I think those are like the true winners here, even

715
00:43:24,360 --> 00:43:26,359
Speaker 1: that they walked away with no money. They won. They

716
00:43:26,400 --> 00:43:29,839
Speaker 1: beat them, they beat everything. That's it. That's all I have.

717
00:43:30,520 --> 00:43:34,080
Speaker 1: Thank you. You can find US online at ridiculous crime

718
00:43:34,120 --> 00:43:36,960
Speaker 1: on both twitter and instagram. Got A tip for us

719
00:43:36,960 --> 00:43:39,960
Speaker 1: about a ridiculous crime you want to hear about? Email

720
00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:43,160
Speaker 1: US ridiculous crime at Gmail Dot Com. That's it. Tune

721
00:43:43,320 --> 00:43:51,600
Speaker 1: next time. Ridiculous crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and

722
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:54,600
Speaker 1: Zarin Burnett, produced and edited by Chairman of the big board,

723
00:43:54,719 --> 00:43:59,160
Speaker 1: Dave Kuston. Research is by seasoned gemologist Marissa Brown. The

724
00:43:59,160 --> 00:44:01,920
Speaker 1: theme song is by Minor Forty Niner Thomas Lee and

725
00:44:02,080 --> 00:44:06,960
Speaker 1: wizen saloon keeper Travis Dutton. Executive Producers Are Skeptical appraisers

726
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:16,719
Speaker 1: Ben Bowen and Noel Brown. We dis say it one

727
00:44:16,719 --> 00:44:22,120
Speaker 1: more time. Dequeous. Ridiculous crime is a production of IHEART radio.

728
00:44:22,400 --> 00:44:24,800
Speaker 1: Four more podcasts to my heart radio, visit the IHEART

729
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730
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