There’s an old adage that I’ve found myself using with increasing frequency over the last decade. The more he spoke of his honesty, the faster we counted our spoons. More and more figureheads seem to adhere to the notion that if you say something loud enough and long enough, people…
As I wrote last month, France’s 31-year-old treasure hunt for a Golden Owl statuette finally ended sometime during the night of October 2/3, 2024. Michel Becker, one of the contest’s organizers, announced that a single person had managed to solve the 11 puzzles that led to a buried bronze replica.…
After more than 30 years of searching, by tens of thousands of passionate treasure seekers, France’s elusive Golden Owl was recovered sometime during the night of October 2/3. I wrote about this trouble-plagued contest back in 2021. If you’d like a more detailed version of its dramatic backstory, you’ll find…
In April of 1993, a man calling himself Max Valentin, buried a bronze replica of a golden statue said to be worth 1 million French francs. Valentin claimed that the statue, which resembled an owl in flight, was hidden somewhere in mainland France. The following month, he published a book…
