17 Tons of gold in New Mexico

MesaBuddy said:
Last I heard was the Mr. Elliott was living in SLC , Utah and that was years ago
You guys ever hear of "Refiners" ? , send them your Ore , the refine it keep a percent for themselves , send you a check for the balance , along with a 1099 at the end of the year for the monies paid to you for your "Ore" , you have to be carefull which one you use though as some have no business morals and will rip you off ;)
MB
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I actually thought about that to mesabuddy but I can not even find a record of him serving, however I have been given a lead as to how to find out who owned the plane involved, it seems that the 440hp conversion was not very common and so im headed down that path as soon as im done trying to locate Mr Elliotts service record, I should add however I am not so sure it was him who made those flights
 

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MB,

I happen to know that a few aspects of my scenario have actually taken place. I doubt there is any proof that it all took place, but know that if it did, the refining took place locally. It's not really what you know, but who you know that counts here.

Of course it's all conjecture, but plausible conjecture. :)

Many, many people know about this story but it is not public knowledge yet......as far as I know. A number of folks who had nothing to do with it and suspect the truth, are doing everything they can to create a false story/history. They have their own reasons for keeping the truth hidden.

So what about my "new" ore theory????

Joe
 

CJ , your "Ore Theory" holds lots of water in my book , I know of some folks that make there own "Nuggets" and "Ore"
I can't believe I just said that , I'm going to shut up now before I get myself in some hot water , (slaps self, shadd up you big dummy) ;D
MB
 

apart from on this thread, has anyone else heard of the gold bar maps that gollum spoke of?.
It seems just a tad far fetched to me, but that does'nt mean it aint true.
my problem with this theory is (1) that why would he have chosen 150 kilos of gold to make the map on (2) why randomly distribute them around the mesa on the ranch with seemingly no direction as to how to find them. (3) why did he choose to wrap them in red canvas and oil cloth? (was he worried they were gonna rust?). (4) why after the death of Leon trabuco did he not recover the gold himself.

the other strange thing about having recovered 3 of the bars and needing another 2 to complete the map is that if it is not widely known someone might come along and discover one of those bars and destroy it thereby eliminating any chance of completing the map, which it was claimed it would be impossible to find the gold without the map

anyone?
 

SWR said:
cactusjumper said:
For that kind of wealth, the government will stop at nothing to acquire it.
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I do not subscribe to the fallacy of “the government will take it from you” if you acquire the product (treasure, gold bars) using legal salvaging avenues. Like any other legitimate business in the US, you would have to pay taxes on gains, income and the like.

It always amazes me reading the “cloak and dagger” scenarios about dispersing of the product…if ever found. That alone speaks volumes.
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you are probably right SWR, but me personaly i have no idea how the american system works, so im on a learning curve. but i dont believe they would just take it and you would get nothing for your efforts
 

I was sent an e-mail letting me know this subject had caught interest again. Have been working some other projects. Last search I did on this project was about three months ago. The area I am searching is interesting, and I will go back again.
Mike, Thanks for your input on this. Have not talked with you in a while.
I have not read every reply here yet, but I will.
SWR..I can always count on you to bring me back to the real world, if I get to far out there. However, I do believe there is reason to go on with this project. Some of us have been ask to prove for a fact that this treasure is real. I would ask in return that someone prove for a fact that it is not real.
Any way it's been a wild ride, this one has. And, I have learned a few things alone the...

Roadquest...Clayton Ramey







Roadquest..Clayton Ramey
 

gollum said:
... That question and statement is from a person who has never had to try and sell gold "under the table" (especially in large amounts). First of all, it's not like the gold is easy to move. It took several months to fly it all into the US (in approximately 1500 pound loads each flight), so as to avoid attracting attention.

Next, let's talk about selling the gold off. ... If they tried to sell the gold "under the table", who would they sell it to? ... etc. Mike
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I agree that selling gold bullion today would arouse a lot of attention from a lot of people, especially today's government, which would settle for their share of taxes if they couldn't confiscate the loot in the first place. But this so-called 17-ton event presumably happened 70 years ago, and I can assure you Mike that the sale of gold bullion in those days was much easier to accomplish. I personally knew a gentleman, now deceased, who got lucky and sold a 30 pound bar of gold to a barber in Silver City, NM, who used it as a doorstop and conversation piece at his business. I verified the story myself as factual by asking some old timers who saw the bar. The seller used the proceeds to buy a ranch near Hondo. Nobody said boo to him, ever.

Let's fast forward to the early 1970's, when it was still illegal to own gold. I was working in an underground mine near Ouray, CO, and visited a fellow worker's father's house one weekend in Montrose. The father was also a miner. In his garage was a wooden box of picture rock high-graded from said mine - about 20 pounds of white quartz shot through with large quantities of coarse gold and wire. I asked my friend about it and he matter-of-factly informed me that the ore was to be sold for cash two weeks hense to a Red Chinese agent who came through town twice a year. No big deal, lots of guys did it when they could get the high-grade, which was often as I witnessed myself in that mine.

Admittedly, these two stories are anecdotal, but they are both true. If one guy like me can relate two examples like this, don't you think that there have been many other occurances? You may be paranoid about attracting attention today, and rightfully so, but not so in days gone by. And in Mexico, a cash sale of gold to an American, European, South American or anyone else would have been even easier for Trabucco and company. There was no reason for them to move the bullion out of their control. This is a good story all right, but chasing it will get you nowhere fast.
 

yep i think that about sums it up, there is greed in all walks of life. people who deal with gold are no exception and are quite possibly worse than some of the other professions.

still intrested to hear if anyone else has heard about the gold bar maps, and if anyone can shed any light on the pilot
 

wonder if this article could be the guy in question?

During World War II, the U.S. Navy would need thousands of qualified, well-trained men to fly and maintain the nearly sixty thousand combat aircraft built for the war effort. Institutions like Baylor University provided many naval aviator cadets to the Navy, which recruited students with one or two years of college study. William (Willie) Elliott, who studied at Baylor from 1940 to 1941 after transferring from St. Mary's University in San Antonio, became one such recruit. He joined the Navy with his brother Conard, who was also a Baylor student. After preflight training, Elliott moved on to intermediate flight training in Corpus Christi, where the aspiring naval air corps pilots flew the T-6 Texan, a training aircraft called the SNJ in the Navy. On December 24, 1942, Ensign Elliott went up for a training flight over the Gulf of Mexico, having logged 190.6 hours of total flying time. After entering a fog bank at five hundred feet, he lost his sense of equilibrium and crashed into the Gulf before he could recover the aircraft's correct path of flight
 

Peer , I don't think thats the right Elliott , he was in the Army Air Corps and supposedly flew pursuit aircraft
MB
 

Gentlemen,

There were one hell of a lot of Bill Elliotts. Many of them took the name, "Wild Bill Elliott".
More than a few adventurers were in that "wild" bunch.

Joe Ribaudo
 

MesaBuddy said:
Peer , I don't think thats the right Elliott , he was in the Army Air Corps and supposedly flew pursuit aircraft
MB
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yes and he was meant to have been shot down over germany in 43, only there is no record of it. so if it is him he survived the war, alternatively it was never him to begin with. but I would have to prove to myself it was not him before I started a search for another pilot.
seems to me that if he was still alive today he is the only living person known from the story. and therefore the best chance of finding out for sure how much gold was landed in NM. he would probably be the only person who may be able to name others who were involved.
Im still not swallowing the gold bar map story, and apart from gollum ive heard no one else mention it.
The government were in talks with the gangs representatives, thats a fact, but it does not mean any gold ever came to the states. it only means that they claimed it did.
the strangest part of the whole thing is after the death of trabuco the caretaker never sold the gold or told his family or friends where it was, and if we are to believe the account that there is a gold bar map, then somewhere out on that ranch around the mesa there are two 30 kilo bars of gold wrapped in red canvas and oil cloth, about $1 million worth?.
 

CJ , could be wild Betty Elliott for all I care , as a matter of fact I know 2 William Elliotts , so whats your point ??? I for certain am not looking for this guy , I tried finding him over 10 years ago and I gave up my search , did he fly the plane ??? I don't have a clue , is he still alive , I don't know and couldn't care less
What I do know is that there is/was a large amount of gold near Shiprock , Aztec , Farmington and quite a few "Knowledgeable People" have been looking for it
Peer , what I am trying to relate to you as I have to Clayton/Roadquest in the past , is "He is ALIVE and and well somewhere in Salt Lake City , Utah , and that is what I had "Heard" from an old man back in the early 80's that spent some time looking into this
This old fart knew where the strip was and the "Trail" that who ever drove the red pickup back and forth from the strip to wherever they concealed the stuff ;D
Check out this thread , http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,101876.0.html
He states (AZEd) that the pictures came out of the Window Rock area , and thats where the "Strip" was where they landed the plane
I don't know if this is related or not
MB
 

MB,

No point at all. Just a point of interest that, like you, I have know a few Bill Elliott's myself, and they seemed to gravitate towards using the old western movie stars nickname.
Those that I knew were heavy drinkers and had pretty exciting lives....as they told it.

Sorry I interupted the flow of conversation. ;)

Allow me to butt out gracefully. :-[

Joe Ribaudo
 

No No , Cj , don't butt out and "No offense was intended towards you" , I get frustrated sometimes , and I was trying to relate some past goings on pertaining to this Elliott and how true , every dang one of em that I knew had the same "Affliction" as the ones you knew ;D
MB
 

I took a look at that thread when it started mesabuddy, but a few things dont fit, firstly the dates although there is a date that seems to be May 1933, the gold was not moved until after that, it took until june of 1933 to have the 17 tons assembled, also the plane shows a mono winged plane whereas the stearman 440 was a bi-plane. there is also mention on another site that someone had found a carving in a rock with 1933 engraved and believed it was a prank.
thats not to say it was just that they believed it to be.
and frankly I see no reason why they would have marked the location anyway since they were ilegaly moving gold from mexico to the US
 

Peer , it is odd that someone would carve a plane into a rock in that area , or maybe I've had way to much fun in the sun the past couple of months , and my brain is cooked like an egg :P
The dates don't match , but it does make me scratch my head ;D
MB
 

MesaBuddy said:
Peer , it is odd that someone would carve a plane into a rock in that area , or maybe I've had way to much fun in the sun the past couple of months , and my brain is cooked like an egg :P
The dates don't match , but it does make me scratch my head ;D
MB
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well i scratched my head to, but that was probably lice. seems the carving was pretty detailed so why not add the extra wing? the plane used was a bi-plane and the dates are just no good at all.
still struggling to even find a record that elliott even served in the US army air corps. I have a feeling that is a red herring.

I would like to get the location of the landing strip though and also the name of the ranch and mesa seems these things should be public knoledge. and do we even have a name for the "caretaker"?
I have contacted a couple of leads in NM and am awaiting replies from them il keep you posted
il PM the guy who posted those pics and see if he is willing to be more specific about there location.

mesabuddy have you ever heard of the gold bar maps except through gollum or this thread?
 

"mesabuddy have you ever heard of the gold bar maps except through gollum or this thread?"
No never , Peer
But what do I know , I'm just a lice infected basalt cowboy ;D :D ;D ;)
MB
 

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