The Oak Island adventure continues Tuesday nights on History Channel's The Curse of Oak Island. On this week's episode, more questions arise as the team continues the quest to find the treasure that has eluded searchers for over 200 years.
BACKGROUND It was in 1795 when Daniel McGinnis and his companions first discovered the Money Pit at the bottom of which is said to lie a hoard of treasure. Just what this treasure is and who buried it remains a mystery. Theories include the Knights Templar, pirates, and Governor Sir William Phips of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Carbon dating results indicate that the artifacts discovered on Oak Island can be placed within a broad range of time periods from as early as the 14th century to as late as the 18th century. This leads researchers, myself included, to believe that whatever activities were being conducted on the island did not start and end with a single party, but was continued by the generations who followed. At which point this operation concluded remains to be seen, though I speculate no later than 1795 when McGinnis and friends discovered the Money Pit; no one since has come forth claiming to know who buried the treasure or what the treasure could be. RUNDOWN This week's episode, "Rick and Mortar," is the fourteenth episode of the eleventh season. Here, we find the Fellowship, the current searcher team led by Rick and Marty Lagina, and mining company Dumas Contracting, Ltd. working to extend the Garden Shaft to a depth of nearly 100 feet. A wood sample, which was recovered in last week's episode, was carbon dated between 1631 and 1684. This places activity within the Money Pit area to the time of Phips, who in 1687 conducted a salvage operation of the sunken Spanish Concepcion. A portion of the recovered treasure may have been buried on Oak Island! The Fellowship is also revisiting borehole H8. Originally drilled in 2017 as part of their effort to locate the treasure vault, this may actually provide the long-sought answers. It had been speculated that spoils from the excavation may have pushed the vault to a deeper depth. Should any evidence be collected that suggests that this is a significant location, further excavations will no doubt be conducted. Lot 5 continues to yield a trove of surprises. Archaeologist Jamie Kouba, MA, RPA, had recovered a soil sample from the stone feature which closely matched samples recovered from the Money Pit area near the Garden Shaft from a depth of 104 feet. This leads the Fellowship to believe that the same party was behind the activity going on in both locations. Lastly, while excavating the lower right corner of the triangle-shape swamp, Billy Gerhardt uncovered a large, conical boulder. Similar to boulders making up Nolan's Cross, the possible relationship between the two cannot go unnoticed. The boulders of Nolan's Cross are speculated to have been put in place by the Knights Templar. With the discovery of the new boulder in the swamp, I am wondering if the overall feature is not just a cross, but the Kabbalah Tree of Life. Though I'm not well-versed in Templar history nor in Kabbalah teaching, from what I have learned thus far, the Knights Templar were no strangers to religious symbolism; ergo, it would not surprise me that they could have constructed an island-sized Tree of Life. CONCLUSION Even though this is not a review, I must say that this was another exciting episode of a series that has left me wanting more since I first began watching. Will the Fellowship's quest finally answer the questions that have been asked since 1795 and bring to light a history that has gone virtually unnoticed? Only time will tell when the centuries-old secrets will finally be revealed, provided that the island is willing.
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