FDR’s Treasure Hunt to Discover Oak Island’s Mysterious Booty
Since 1795, explorers—including our 32nd president—have traveled to Oak Island in search of a mysterious buried and booby-trapped treasure.
The Daily Beast,Hulton Archive
For more than 200 years, treasure hunters have been lured to Oak Island, a lush, 140-acre piece of land off the coast of Nova Scotia, where a hole dubbed the “Money Pit” promises a bounty of hidden wealth—if they can reach it.
This tireless stream of explorers—including Franklin Delano Roosevelt—has come fully armed with gold-detecting, water-pumping, and earth-scanning machines. But, so far, the millions poured into this quixotic search for buried treasure have yielded no gold, just a handful of tantalizing clues that are convincing enough to inspire new followers to come and try their luck…until they, too, unfailingly blow through their financing and return home empty-handed.
The only thing that has yet to run dry is a complex system of booby-trapped water tunnels that flood the shaft every time explorers seem on the verge of a discovery. They have proven a deadly opponent in the quest for treasure—so far, six explorers have perished while digging on Oak Island.
