Video 4 - The Peralta Stone Maps with Frank Augustine

[somehiker]

i have a Q about these rocks, why would the ones ive pointed out, be cut
like they are

View attachment 1170383

Lots of reasons for broken rocks. While those you indicated may have been unbroken at the time they were used for the arrastra, heat from a forest fire for example, or water getting into cracks and freezing at night can cause them to break up like that over time.

Regards:SH.

 

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[Azquester]

This was a nice one. Even got to work the material in the bottom!

My in law took it home and panned it. It was full of Mercury beads.

I'm standing right next to it drywashing. This area has about a dozen of these things!


View attachment 1170441View attachment 1170442

 

[somehiker]

Lynda,

On the south bank of QC, west of the southbound portion of rt 60, there is the remnant of a very old trail that cuts down the bank and starts crossing over the washes just as it reaches the bridges themselves. Although severely eroded by now, if you put yourself in the right place, you can see it. Perhaps Ryan can check this out next time he is out there and get a shot from the right perspective (looking down the trail, facing slightly northeast).

It is no accident that there is a site of interest at the spot where a trail crosses over a water source, as these were customarily places to strike camp in the wagon days.

As far as your assertion that this place would have been suicidal from a defensive standpoint, that depends on what era and what antagonist you are talking about.

Looking down that trail toward the two bridges.
The trail may have connected to the Silver King road, since it can be seen (on G/E) as continuing in a straight line beyond the bridge and towards the gravel pit.

View attachment 100_1536sm.bmp

What it looks like from the eastbound lanes across the western most span.

View attachment 100_0966sm.bmp

And another shot from the top, east side of the embankment, where Mitchell pointed to when telling Bernice McGee where Tumlinson had found the stones.

View attachment 100_0973sm WN.bmp

View attachment McGee article AA pg 12.bmp

Regards:SH.

 

[Azquester]

This Video was shot from this last Sunday cw0909.

It might give you some idea what the terrain looks like today. Lots of quartz and mainly flat open desert.

 

[somehiker]

In the last photo of the previous post, that IS the tip of Weavers Needle just visible above the east end of Superstition Mountain.
I would have put this in an edit to the previous post, but it seems that is what makes the photos invalid, once you "save" the changes.

 

[Azquester]

Hiker,

When I went up there Sunday just like the other time I went there I mistook the bridge as being further west. You can see why in these photo's. One is yours from the Queen Creek bridge and the other is mine from Google Earth. Both have a wagon trail angled crossing under the Bridge! But the one I took is from the bridge west of QC.

You can see why these two bridges can be mistaken for Queen Creek!

I found an old Hubcap from a 1930's automobile missing the center piece at one of these sites. I'm going back next time with a detector and see if I can find the emblem for it. I hope it says "Oldsmobile"!

 

[coazon de oro]

Hiker,

When I went up there Sunday just like the other time I went there I mistook the bridge as being further west. You can see why in these photo's. One is yours from the Queen Creek bridge and the other is mine from Google Earth. Both have a wagon trail angled crossing under the Bridge! But the one I took is from the bridge west of QC.

You can see why these two bridges can be mistaken for Queen Creek!

I found an old Hubcap from a 1930's automobile missing the center piece at one of these sites. I'm going back next time with a detector and see if I can find the emblem for it. I hope it says "Oldsmobile"!

Howdy Bill,

Goes to show you that Yogi Berra was right. "If you don't know where you are going, you might wind up some where else". Sticking to the flub quotes some boots on the ground hunters live by, "You can observe a lot just by watching". (Y.B.)

Homar

 

[Absurd-Ginger]

Any ideas on the DB 40? Here is a photo that I shot.

D - I see nothing

B - I see what looks to be a "key" extending to the (photo) top right

4 -I see an arrow pointing down

0 - I see an arrow pointing up

Best guess is initials from 1940. The person could be anyone around that time. The date would match the aging/decaying ingrained into the saguaro. The arrows are what look like from a later date. Ill go check it out myself when I have time. Keep up the good work. Got yourself a new watcher.

 

[somehiker]

Nice video Bill.
You missed the second grave sized hole which was straight ahead of you at the 1:20 mark. You can see the twisted saguaro nearby and dirt pile though.
But you did find the other two big, but shallower holes.
Travis did not need to dig a hole to get the first stone. He noticed it while climbing up the embankment, near the top. Looked interesting, so he dug it out of the bank using a tin can he found nearby. It was the H/P stone (with Spanish writing on it). He had probably parked about where you were, at the bottom of the highway embankment where the cop told you to move along, and climbed up to the top from there. I've done it myself and it gives a good idea as to how thick that upper layer of river rock and cement-like sand and gravel is. It also shows how easy it would be to trip over something sticking out of that embankment, while climbing up and down by the same route. Not easy while carrying a can of water for your radiator, if that was the reason on one of his several visits to the site. An overheating car, perhaps even boiling over, is a good enough reason to stop there, and the traffic wouldn't have been as heavy or moving as fast back in 1948. If he was on his way to visit family in Texas for Christmas, and he had seen water in the creek as passed over the bridge, it makes sense that he would have stopped there.....right side or left, doesn't really matter as it was only two lanes at that time. So I also see this as quite plausible. I've been there and done that myself.
Now, arrowheads. Both myself and Cubfan have proven to ourselves that part of the story may also be true. It IS a good place to look for them. Even more so since a grass fire about three years ago burned off all the grass which was half way to my knees the first time I visited in April of 2010. When I went there with Paul in 2011, that was the first thing I said to him when I noticed the grass was so bare...."watch out for arrowheads". Various bits of documented (letters,books,articles,etc) information tells us that an "indian" village once occupied the site and that Travis had heard that it was a good place to look for arrowheads and had in fact stopped there to look for same previous to 1948.

I think this is a big part of the problem in understanding the who's, where's, what's and when's......or the "Who's on First"..... of the whole thing.
Different details at different times as told to different people....only one of which was present for the finding of the stones themselves. That would be his Uncle Robert, since nothing from his wife Aileen has turned up so far. Just because one story differs in some details from another, even when from the same person, it doesn't mean one story or the other is false. It may only be a matter of memory lapses as to the chronology of those four "W's", or a given detail missing from a telling of the story.

Scene 2 of course, opens with Travis,Aileen and Robert returning to look for what Travis believes should be somewhere around where he found the first stone.
I think the preponderance of evidence puts this one year later, during the Christmas holidays of 1949. Travis has had a year to ponder the engraved artwork and wording on the H/P stone and is sure there must be more. Stones it seems, since there is no mention of a mine or treasure as yet.

I'll continue this later.....got some other stuff waiting.

Regards:SH.

 

[somehiker]

Well Bill, what can I say?
Yer probably not the only one though....

Just a coupla things before I sign off for a bit....

The stones weren't buried very deep, with the H/P near the top of the bank and sticking out a bit.
It may have been left partly exposed.....and with some damage at the top center as well....by the power shovel and/or bulldozers that were used to make the cut for the roadway. There is a mention made somewhere in the collection of accounts, which says that long before the Tumlinsons found the stone maps out there, a highway construction crew found some carved stones (maps) while building that highway. My thought is that if additional maps were needed to complete the journey to it's final destination, these may have been what was required.
The two map stones were found a couple of feet down, with the red heart stone just below the big stones, so he wouldn't have had to dig as big a hole as the others we see out there a hundred yards or so further east.

Whoever dug all those deeper holes out there, they chose specific spots. And in two cases at least, went to a great deal of time and labour to dig down till they hit paydirt, or at least were satisfied that they had uncovered everything. It isn't solid rock, but it sure is solid enough to at least require a pick and shovel. That's why I argued with Jim Hatt that there was no way those stones fell off of a Peralta Mule after the massacre and simply sunk below the surface on their own.
Those folks who left the open holes behind wouldn't have had as tough a time digging up what had been already dug in order to bury the stones and whatever else was found out there. The "tailings" you were looking at tells the truth about that. None of that is fused together, like the "virgin" ground which surrounds those deeper holes.

 

[UncleMatt]

Somehiker, is the photo with the tip of Weaver's Needle taken near the highway, or was it taken up on a nearby hill? Is that tip visible with the unaided human eye, or do you have to use an enlarged camera image or binoculars/ telescope to see that as you do in the photo?

 

[Las Vegas Bob]

To me it odes not have the shape of Weavers needle looks to broad at the top.

 

[deducer]

To me it odes not have the shape of Weavers needle looks to broad at the top.

WN is eroding pretty quick. It would have been more prominent in Travis's day.

And a heck of a lot more prominent to those that left the markers behind.

 

[Azquester]

You're absolutely right Wayne.

I guess my question would be "Did they have the bridge marked as being Queen Creek back then?" Because right down the road they were also building another bridge similar but further west and it's very easy to get those two confused. Both have a small hill as you approach on the north side and both look the same on maps or in person.

What would be the significance of the rock piles?

Travis's Uncle Bob found a pack saddle and Jesuit Jeweled Cross using the maps I assume in that area. That may have supported Jim Hatt's theory of the maps falling out of a Burro. My first thought also.



Even though I went to the wrong area I thought it was the right area so I taped it. It's very similar looking terrain and it also has a hidden rock pile with some small dig spots. I'll see if I can upload that Video to you tube.

That was the place I found the old hubcap.

I need to get one of those dry pans Frank told me about. I see some good spots to sample!

I think a sweep of the area with a team of metal detectors and a Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) may find any other maps missed. I'd use about a ten or twenty MHz. Nice flat area now without any grass it'd be easy to pull a GPR and get nice clean readings in two DD. Ten to twenty feet down. I've rented and used them in the past with good results.


I'd like to play Travis T only I'd find the meaning of the maps before I die in the last scene. It's easy for me to play a crippled up mapped out engraving old rock man because I am one!

But, I must know in the end who get's buried in those grave's?

I guess the last stone to be found will be my own Tombstone!

R-io
I-ndian
P-eralta

RIP

Nice video Bill.
You missed the second grave sized hole which was straight ahead of you at the 1:20 mark. You can see the twisted saguaro nearby and dirt pile though.
But you did find the other two big, but shallower holes.
Travis did not need to dig a hole to get the first stone. He noticed it while climbing up the embankment, near the top. Looked interesting, so he dug it out of the bank using a tin can he found nearby. It was the H/P stone (with Spanish writing on it). He had probably parked about where you were, at the bottom of the highway embankment where the cop told you to move along, and climbed up to the top from there. I've done it myself and it gives a good idea as to how thick that upper layer of river rock and cement-like sand and gravel is. It also shows how easy it would be to trip over something sticking out of that embankment, while climbing up and down by the same route. Not easy while carrying a can of water for your radiator, if that was the reason on one of his several visits to the site. An overheating car, perhaps even boiling over, is a good enough reason to stop there, and the traffic wouldn't have been as heavy or moving as fast back in 1948. If he was on his way to visit family in Texas for Christmas, and he had seen water in the creek as passed over the bridge, it makes sense that he would have stopped there.....right side or left, doesn't really matter as it was only two lanes at that time. So I also see this as quite plausible. I've been there and done that myself.
Now, arrowheads. Both myself and Cubfan have proven to ourselves that part of the story may also be true. It IS a good place to look for them. Even more so since a grass fire about three years ago burned off all the grass which was half way to my knees the first time I visited in April of 2010. When I went there with Paul in 2011, that was the first thing I said to him when I noticed the grass was so bare...."watch out for arrowheads". Various bits of documented (letters,books,articles,etc) information tells us that an "indian" village once occupied the site and that Travis had heard that it was a good place to look for arrowheads and had in fact stopped there to look for same previous to 1948.

I think this is a big part of the problem in understanding the who's, where's, what's and when's......or the "Who's on First"..... of the whole thing.
Different details at different times as told to different people....only one of which was present for the finding of the stones themselves. That would be his Uncle Robert, since nothing from his wife Aileen has turned up so far. Just because one story differs in some details from another, even when from the same person, it doesn't mean one story or the other is false. It may only be a matter of memory lapses as to the chronology of those four "W's", or a given detail missing from a telling of the story.

Scene 2 of course, opens with Travis,Aileen and Robert returning to look for what Travis believes should be somewhere around where he found the first stone.
I think the preponderance of evidence puts this one year later, during the Christmas holidays of 1949. Travis has had a year to ponder the engraved artwork and wording on the H/P stone and is sure there must be more. Stones it seems, since there is no mention of a mine or treasure as yet.

I'll continue this later.....got some other stuff waiting.

Regards:SH.

 

[Azquester]

So the construction crew did find other maps? Is that documented?

That would be a real solid piece of evidence towards the certification of Travis's story.

The first time I was there many years ago I think it had a lot of grasses and was way harder to see any holes. We parked way back from the bridge towards the east and made our way west along the north side with a sweeping search pattern. We looked along the fence line first just like Travis said where he found the first Stone Map PH/HP.

Find the pottery and find the arrow heads I say.

The material that came out of that hole was taken away for some reason not enough there for a refill. It may be just what I said it was a disturbed grave dug up by Treasure Hunters and the Coffin removed for the value of the silver handles. That would explain the missing dirt and rock. Room for the Coffin.

May have been the stone map makers grave. He buried the maps as he was dying and left his legacy in the ground close to his own resting place.

I'm sure the other stone maps would have explained the mystery of the series with the key.

And I don't think the keystone was removed by the bridge construction. I think it may still lie beneath the wind blown dusts of another place and time.

The wind blown dusts of the Travis Twilight Zone.

Well Bill, what can I say?
Yer probably not the only one though....

Just a coupla things before I sign off for a bit....

The stones weren't buried very deep, with the H/P near the top of the bank and sticking out a bit.
It may have been left partly exposed.....and with some damage at the top center as well....by the power shovel and/or bulldozers that were used to make the cut for the roadway. There is a mention made somewhere in the collection of accounts, which says that long before the Tumlinsons found the stone maps out there, a highway construction crew found some carved stones (maps) while building that highway. My thought is that if additional maps were needed to complete the journey to it's final destination, these may have been what was required.
The two map stones were found a couple of feet down, with the red heart stone just below the big stones, so he wouldn't have had to dig as big a hole as the others we see out there a hundred yards or so further east.

Whoever dug all those deeper holes out there, they chose specific spots. And in two cases at least, went to a great deal of time and labour to dig down till they hit paydirt, or at least were satisfied that they had uncovered everything. It isn't solid rock, but it sure is solid enough to at least require a pick and shovel. That's why I argued with Jim Hatt that there was no way those stones fell off of a Peralta Mule after the massacre and simply sunk below the surface on their own.
Those folks who left the open holes behind wouldn't have had as tough a time digging up what had been already dug in order to bury the stones and whatever else was found out there. The "tailings" you were looking at tells the truth about that. None of that is fused together, like the "virgin" ground which surrounds those deeper holes.

 

[Hal Croves]

This Video was shot from this last Sunday cw0909.

It might give you some idea what the terrain looks like today. Lots of quartz and mainly flat open desert.

Your videos are getting better with each post Bill.
Nice job.

 

[cw0909]

Travis Marlowe aka Clarence O. Mitchell, is kind of suspicious to
me because he lived in queen valley, and had a stock swindle.
was there ever proof Travis Tumlinson, and Travis Marlowe
knew each other, or do i remember it wrong, it has been awhile
since i read the Bernice files

the imgs dont come through in a quote weird
ill see if i can copy paste

Looking down that trail toward the two bridges.
The trail may have connected to the Silver King road, since it can be seen (on G/E) as continuing in a straight line beyond the bridge and towards the gravel pit.

View attachment 1170424

What it looks like from the eastbound lanes across the western most span.

View attachment 1170430

And another shot from the top, east side of the embankment, where Mitchell pointed to when telling Bernice McGee where Tumlinson had found the stones.

View attachment 1170436

View attachment 1170447

Regards:SH.

 

[somehiker]

Somehiker, is the photo with the tip of Weaver's Needle taken near the highway, or was it taken up on a nearby hill? Is that tip visible with the unaided human eye, or do you have to use an enlarged camera image or binoculars/ telescope to see that as you do in the photo?

From just about any point to the south, this is Weavers Needle.
The tip is all you can see in the photos I posted.
It was taken Aug 2013, from the top of the embankment on the east side of the highway.
It can be seen with the naked eye, but binoculars .....or a rifle scope like Robert Tumlinson had to take into town for repairs (maybe he dropped it out there), would make the needle easier to make out.

View attachment WN from south.bmp

 

[somehiker]

You're absolutely right Wayne.

I guess my question would be "Did they have the bridge marked as being Queen Creek back then?" Because right down the road they were also building another bridge similar but further west and it's very easy to get those two confused. Both have a small hill as you approach on the north side and both look the same on maps or in person.

........well, that IS Queen Creek, so they might have. The other creek in your G/E crop doesn't seem to have a name, and comes from the north side of Black Point.

What would be the significance of the rock piles?

........the rock piles may have originally been markers/cairns for what was buried.
There are other rock piles further SE, which MAY have been from the old smelters rumored to have been in the area, but I haven't checked them out yet.

Travis's Uncle Bob found a pack saddle and Jesuit Jeweled Cross using the maps I assume in that area. That may have supported Jim Hatt's theory of the maps falling out of a Burro. My first thought also.

.........Travis and his Uncle had a big falling out, possibly over Robert bringing outsiders on board while Travis was sick, so big in fact that Robert didn't even know that Travis had died. So obviously Aileen and the rest of the Tumlinson family weren't talking to him either.....wonder why ? Robert claimed the artifacts were found in a cave, but those holes out there make me suspicious that Travis found out that Robert and his friends had been doing some digging out there. Doesn't sound like they shared any of it with him.
With cowboys and other folks tramping around the area....rest stop bla bla bla....not much chance of anything like a pack saddle or a musket to be still laying on the surface by the 40's or 50's.


Even though I went to the wrong area I thought it was the right area so I taped it. It's very similar looking terrain and it also has a hidden rock pile with some small dig spots. I'll see if I can upload that Video to you tube.

......What's a "hidden rock pile" Do you have a photo of one ?

That was the place I found the old hubcap.

Travis favored Oldsmobiles. And we have determined that the car in the "Bumper Photo" is a 1939 Olds. That has been discussed many times in the last few years.
Quite likely that he had explored a larger area while he was still alive and able to....perhaps with Robert Garmin. It's kinda interesting that Robert doesn't mention Travis, who had passed away in 1961, a year before Robert wrote that letter to Garman.

I need to get one of those dry pans Frank told me about. I see some good spots to sample!

I think a sweep of the area with a team of metal detectors and a Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) may find any other maps missed. I'd use about a ten or twenty MHz. Nice flat area now without any grass it'd be easy to pull a GPR and get nice clean readings in two DD. Ten to twenty feet down. I've rented and used them in the past with good results.


I'd like to play Travis T only I'd find the meaning of the maps before I die in the last scene. It's easy for me to play a crippled up mapped out engraving old rock man because I am one!

But, I must know in the end who get's buried in those grave's?

....well, I doubt he/they buried themselves.

I guess the last stone to be found will be my own Tombstone!

R-io
I-ndian
P-eralta

RIP

Regards:SH.

 

[somehiker]

Travis Marlowe aka Clarence O. Mitchell, is kind of suspicious to
me because he lived in queen valley, and had a stock swindle.
was there ever proof Travis Tumlinson, and Travis Marlowe
knew each other, or do i remember it wrong, it has been awhile
since i read the Bernice files

the imgs dont come through in a quote weird
ill see if i can copy paste

Are you suspicious of EVERYONE who lives in Queen Valley....actually the Gold Canyon development BTW ?

Mitchell's Moel share selling began well before he purchased the stones from Aileen Tumlinson.
He started MOEL to offer shares in a mining and detection equipment venture.....nothing to do with the stone maps or Travis Tumlinson at first.
It wasn't till the stockholders found out from the Life Magazine article that he had these "treasure maps" and had been searching for the goodies, that the s--t hit the fan. Somebody ratted him out to the feds for selling more shares than he was authorized to sell....not that many over the limit really. But it was enough to force MOEL into bankruptcy. It doesn't seem like the case ever went to trial. It was settled some other way. Arbitration maybe ?