An NC native hid treasure worth millions across the US. The clues are in his new book
A North Carolina native decided to spend millions of dollars purchasing various treasures. But instead of keeping the items for himself or donating them to a museum or educational institution, Jon Collins-Black divided them into five boxes and hid them across the United States.
Only he knows where the items are stashed, but he’s inviting anyone to search for them. Treasure hunters will find clues to the boxes in Collins-Black’s new book, “There’s Treasure Inside,” available now for pre-order.
Now living in California, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill alumnus spoke with The News & Observer about his story and latest project.
Jon Collins-Black: musician, treasure hunter, publisher, entrepreneur, investor
Collins-Black grew up near Statesville, about 40 miles north of Charlotte, in a log home his father built for his mother on 20 acres in Iredell County. While he has family in Winston-Salem, and his father attended Wake Forest University, Collins-Black spent most of his time in the Tar Heel state in Statesville and Chapel Hill, where he studied international studies and creative literature.
For about six years after graduation, Collins-Black worked in the self-help industry, doing personal development seminars across the country. He ended up in Texas and decided he wanted to pursue music — something he enjoyed during high school and college — so he moved to California.
But after a while, he decided to leave the music industry, feeling burned out. He took some time off to ponder his next move.
“If I could clone myself, there’s lots of different things I would like to do with my life, and one of those is, it’d be really cool just to be a treasure hunter,” he said.
Collins-Black spent more than a year searching for Forrest Fenn’s treasure. (In 2010, Fenn hid a chest filled with gold and other items, estimated to be worth at least $1 million, somewhere in the Rocky Mountains. He then published “The Thrill of the Chase: A Memoir,” which included a poem that, if solved, would lead one to the treasure.)
Collins-Black did not find Fenn’s treasure (though it was discovered in 2020), but it still excited him and made him think he’d like to create a treasure hunt, too.
Beginning in 2017, his financial situation changed. Collins-Black created internet properties and websites that offered guidance on landing jobs, which “did very well” for him, allowing him to invest, including in Bitcoin.
When COVID-19 shut everything down, Collins-Black again considered his next venture and had two thoughts: Start a publishing company focused on children’s literature, and create a national treasure hunt.
He did both.
What’s in the treasure chests?
Collins-Black sourced items from a rare minerals dealer based in Dallas and began following major auction houses in Hong Kong, the United Kingdom and the U.S.
“My list of items I wanted was constantly evolving,” he said. “It was a combination of things that I thought were really cool, but I also wanted to appeal to a wide variety of ages and interests and backgrounds.”
Here are some of the items he collected:
- A 23-karat gold pendant designed by Pablo Picasso
- A gold medal won by the men’s Nigerian soccer team at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta
- A Michael Jordan rookie card
- A sapphire and diamond brooch owned by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
- Rare Pokemon cards
- Pages from Henry David Thoreau’s personal journal
“I don’t know how many spouses would be OK with their spouse spending millions of dollars buying treasure that someone else is gonna find, but [my wife] was OK with it,” Collins-Black said. “We support each other in our passions, no matter how eccentric they may be.”
In addition to the objects inside the boxes, Collins-Black wanted the boxes themselves to be unique. He came across a metal puzzle box made by Seth Gould, who lives in Bakersville, North Carolina. Gould spent over a year building five chests, which Collins-Black has hidden across the U.S.
How can you find the treasure?
Collins-Black included clues to the treasure chests in his book, but he didn’t want that to be the entirety of the manuscript.
“My goal with writing the book was, can I write a book that people would love to read even if they didn’t want to search for the treasure,” he said.
He hired researchers to help gather detailed information and history about the items he collected, which became the bulk of the book.
But he also wanted to explore the definition of treasure. It’s not just a material thing, the author said. It can be a relationship, a memory or a dream, so in some way, everyone is a treasure hunter, Collins-Black argues in the book.
How did Jon Collins-Black hide the chests?
One of the reasons Collins-Black divided the treasure into five chests and hid them in five locations was because he wanted the treasure to seem more accessible to all readers. He didn’t want people to feel that they needed to travel great distances to search for the treasure, he said.
Collins-Black had a couple of ideas for locations to hide the chests, but the rest took some more thinking. He ended up hiking more than 100 miles while scouting for potential hiding spots.
But because he is the only person who knows where the chests are, it’s not possible to test the difficulty of the hunt. No one has tried to find the treasure yet.
“You kind of have to use your own best instincts and judgment, so I did that to the best of my ability,” Collins-Black said. “I guess we’re going to find out.”
The author — a lover of puzzles — doesn’t want the search to go on forever, though. So if years down the road he feels that the clues are too difficult, he reserves the right to provide additional information.
In the meantime, there are a few things Collins-Black wants hunters to know.
- The treasure is hidden in safe places, and not on private property.
- Hidden doesn’t mean buried.
- Collins-Black wants people to put their devices down and spend some time in nature.
“I didn’t necessarily hide a treasure in North Carolina,” Collins-Black said, “but the fact that I’m from that area, and there’s five treasures, there’s probably a reasonable expectation that there’s something to be found in and around the South.”
