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The following letter will be fired out to all of the BLM offices, GSENM management, DOGM, and every 4wd group and outdoor enthusiast site I can find. If you know of a site that I have missed, please feel free to cut and paste and post.
Historic tunnels in Kanab to be destroyed – Corey Shuman, GRE, Inc. April 5th, 2008
There are a series of tunnels in Kanab that have long been associated with the Aztec empire and hidden Spanish gold. The area has never been mined, however it has been excavated. It’s an Indiana Jones type of adventure but its real, and it’s in our own back yard. In 1914, Freddie Crystal rolled into Kanab, Utah, with a map, a map he claimed would lead directly to a piece of the horde that had been stashed by Montezuma hundreds of years ago. He showed the map around, looking for information on the surrounding country. Almost everyone who saw the map recognized the area in question as “White Mountain†and pointed him in that direction.
Once in the area, Freddie immediately found signs that he was in the right place, Aztec writings littered the area, and the map directed him right to an ancient set of stairs cut directly into the mountain. He followed the steps up to a sealed entrance, and from that point, the hunt was on. He went back into Kanab and announced that he had found what he was looking for, but now needed help in excavating the site. The townspeople rallied and nearly emptied the town of Kanab. They broke through numerous blockades in the mountain, encountering deadfall traps and other perils showing that these tunnels were not meant to be accessed by anyone but a descendant of the Aztecs who knew how to disable the pitfalls. The excavation went on for almost a year, clearing deadfall after deadfall, finding relics and ancient items, but never the gold. Finally, with the tunnels all reopened and no gold found the townspeople went back to their day to day lives and forgot about the tunnels up in Johnson canyon.
Brandt Childs remembers: “ "It led into a big room," he says, "but all they found was just bones of mules and a few artifacts. No gold. But then they found another tunnel and it had a plug in it too. So they dug it out."
At the end of the second tunnel, the gold seekers came upon still another cavernous room in which they discovered a large human skeleton propped in a sitting position. "They called him Smiley," recalls Child, "because he looked like he was smiling."
No one else in the room was smiling, however, because there was no gold whatsoever-only a handful of pre-Columbian artifacts plus a sacrificial altar, "where they'd tear the hearts out of men and throw their bodies over the cliff." Also, the ashes of ancient campfires, "with human fingers all wrapped in bark, ready for roasting, and human legs, and things like that."
Great story, right? Pack up and you’re all ready to go check out this area. However, this brings Gold Rush Expeditions in to the story, in the beginning of April, almost like an April fools joke, the Department of Oil Gas and Mining (OGM) announced that they were going to begin operations shortly to “reclaim†this mine site. “What??†This isn’t a mine site, it’s an obviously a site of historic and archeological significance. Add to that the site isn’t a mine, or anything close to it, its origins date back to the times of Cortez, Montezuma.
So then WTF is the OGM doing down there. Well, it’s the latest of a long line of intrusions from the OGM, destroying what little is left of Utah’s history, mining and otherwise. GRE has been advocating for years that this organization either needs to be removed, or revamped to help preserve the amazing historical sites that Utah has to offer. The OGM was founded to reclaim coal mines, and is funded from coal mine money. But, in the opinion of GRE, it’s not that interesting to close up coal mines, so why not move into hard rock mines, and historic sites? Areas of historic significance are being destroyed, while the open abandoned coal mines across the state, the ones that OGM should be addressing, are being left open with no attention. And in the case of the tunnels in Johnson canyon, these sites are not well known, and so it’s easy enough for OGM to step in and destroy the sites forever.
So what now, will OGM be successful in their bid to destroy this site next? There is a push from Doug Powell of the Grand Staircase Escalante National monument to “reclaim†these tunnels. And if uncontested, this historic area will be destroyed by these groups that are supposed to protect our resources.
GRE will be spearheading an effort to stop this closure, but we need your help. On April 11th, GRE will be heading down to Kanab to meet with area historians to document and tour the site. We welcome anyone who would like to join us for this excursion. In addition will be writing letters to the Grand Staircase Escalante Monument management, the Division of Oil, Gas and Mining and the Kane County BLM to voice our opposition to this destructive initiative.
If you would like to help, please email info@goldrushexpeditions.com for more information on how you can help. If you have any contacts in the media that can help to bring publicity to this issue, please let me know.Your history is being eradicated now, and you need to make your opinions heard now to stop the destruction.
Thanks for your time and efforts.
Historic tunnels in Kanab to be destroyed – Corey Shuman, GRE, Inc. April 5th, 2008
There are a series of tunnels in Kanab that have long been associated with the Aztec empire and hidden Spanish gold. The area has never been mined, however it has been excavated. It’s an Indiana Jones type of adventure but its real, and it’s in our own back yard. In 1914, Freddie Crystal rolled into Kanab, Utah, with a map, a map he claimed would lead directly to a piece of the horde that had been stashed by Montezuma hundreds of years ago. He showed the map around, looking for information on the surrounding country. Almost everyone who saw the map recognized the area in question as “White Mountain†and pointed him in that direction.
Once in the area, Freddie immediately found signs that he was in the right place, Aztec writings littered the area, and the map directed him right to an ancient set of stairs cut directly into the mountain. He followed the steps up to a sealed entrance, and from that point, the hunt was on. He went back into Kanab and announced that he had found what he was looking for, but now needed help in excavating the site. The townspeople rallied and nearly emptied the town of Kanab. They broke through numerous blockades in the mountain, encountering deadfall traps and other perils showing that these tunnels were not meant to be accessed by anyone but a descendant of the Aztecs who knew how to disable the pitfalls. The excavation went on for almost a year, clearing deadfall after deadfall, finding relics and ancient items, but never the gold. Finally, with the tunnels all reopened and no gold found the townspeople went back to their day to day lives and forgot about the tunnels up in Johnson canyon.
Brandt Childs remembers: “ "It led into a big room," he says, "but all they found was just bones of mules and a few artifacts. No gold. But then they found another tunnel and it had a plug in it too. So they dug it out."
At the end of the second tunnel, the gold seekers came upon still another cavernous room in which they discovered a large human skeleton propped in a sitting position. "They called him Smiley," recalls Child, "because he looked like he was smiling."
No one else in the room was smiling, however, because there was no gold whatsoever-only a handful of pre-Columbian artifacts plus a sacrificial altar, "where they'd tear the hearts out of men and throw their bodies over the cliff." Also, the ashes of ancient campfires, "with human fingers all wrapped in bark, ready for roasting, and human legs, and things like that."
Great story, right? Pack up and you’re all ready to go check out this area. However, this brings Gold Rush Expeditions in to the story, in the beginning of April, almost like an April fools joke, the Department of Oil Gas and Mining (OGM) announced that they were going to begin operations shortly to “reclaim†this mine site. “What??†This isn’t a mine site, it’s an obviously a site of historic and archeological significance. Add to that the site isn’t a mine, or anything close to it, its origins date back to the times of Cortez, Montezuma.
So then WTF is the OGM doing down there. Well, it’s the latest of a long line of intrusions from the OGM, destroying what little is left of Utah’s history, mining and otherwise. GRE has been advocating for years that this organization either needs to be removed, or revamped to help preserve the amazing historical sites that Utah has to offer. The OGM was founded to reclaim coal mines, and is funded from coal mine money. But, in the opinion of GRE, it’s not that interesting to close up coal mines, so why not move into hard rock mines, and historic sites? Areas of historic significance are being destroyed, while the open abandoned coal mines across the state, the ones that OGM should be addressing, are being left open with no attention. And in the case of the tunnels in Johnson canyon, these sites are not well known, and so it’s easy enough for OGM to step in and destroy the sites forever.
So what now, will OGM be successful in their bid to destroy this site next? There is a push from Doug Powell of the Grand Staircase Escalante National monument to “reclaim†these tunnels. And if uncontested, this historic area will be destroyed by these groups that are supposed to protect our resources.
GRE will be spearheading an effort to stop this closure, but we need your help. On April 11th, GRE will be heading down to Kanab to meet with area historians to document and tour the site. We welcome anyone who would like to join us for this excursion. In addition will be writing letters to the Grand Staircase Escalante Monument management, the Division of Oil, Gas and Mining and the Kane County BLM to voice our opposition to this destructive initiative.
If you would like to help, please email info@goldrushexpeditions.com for more information on how you can help. If you have any contacts in the media that can help to bring publicity to this issue, please let me know.Your history is being eradicated now, and you need to make your opinions heard now to stop the destruction.
Thanks for your time and efforts.
OGM is upsetting me about as much as the liberals trying to remove my gun rights and minority races being treated like kings. At every bit of news, the future seems more and more grim. Its sad that an area like this is planned to be destroyed. I completely agree with the statement that OGM is going too far and is an organization that we do not "need." OGM is out of control and I'm tired of seeing their gates over mines that I've driven hundreds of miles to see. 
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