There's Treasure Inside — our search log.
Jon Collins-Black hid five ornate chests worth roughly $2 million and published the clues in There's Treasure Inside (2024-11-12). None have been publicly found. This page is our research surface — public-domain facts only, focused on the chest the geography already supports.
What's known publicly
Book + hunt went live together. About 18 months in.
Each in a different state. No two adjacent (with a small-state east-coast caveat).
Four boxes 'comfortably six digits' each; Lion's Share well over a million.
As of Jon's most recent public updates. None of the five retrieved.
Other confirmed: no 4WD needed (one box might be 'a little bumpy'); searchers have been within 200 feet of the Pokémon box without finding it; Lion's Share is inside a Seth-Gould-built puzzle box requiring seven clever actions to open.
The five boxes (community framing)
Names + regions from the community (Mysterious Writings, Reddit, unofficial wiki). Jon hasn't endorsed any specific solve. focus = what we're working; warm = meaningful BOTG done; open = anyone's guess.
Homage to Forrest Fenn's 2010–2020 hunt. Jon ruled out south of Santa Fe NM and Yellowstone NP interior. Value 'comfortably six digits.' Two poems matter — Fenn's and Jon's.
A dashed trail on the book's map matches a side trail off the AT at Little Rock Pond, Vermont. Multiple searchers have BOTG'd there without finding it.
Inspired by a family road trip. Includes a first-edition Charizard. Jon said searchers have been within 200 ft.
A coin angle on the book's map matches the CA/NV border — consensus leans Tahoe, but Idaho, Oregon, NC/SC, and Ohio remain live.
The biggest box, well over $1M. Clues are scattered across chapters. Container is a Seth Gould puzzle box requiring 7 actions to open.
Our starting point: the Forrest Fenn Box
Of the five, this box has the tightest public constraints. Jon confirmed two eliminations: south of Santa Fe, NM and Yellowstone National Park interior . Live area is Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, and northern NM — cross with Fenn's elevation band (5,000–10,200 ft) and the search space collapses to mountain zones in four states.
No other box has confirmed geographic eliminations, 13 years of Fenn community decoding to borrow from, or a tractable road-network graph to filter against. That's why we start here.
How big is the search space?
Each confirmed constraint removes a fraction of CO + MT + WY + northern NM. Elevation and road-access figures are estimates from TIGER/Line geometry.
† Estimates. Elevation + road-access filters reduce four mountain states to a tractable grid — structured, not random.
Forrest Fenn's poem — vocabulary Jon likely borrowed
Jon called his box an explicit homage to Fenn — the working hypothesis is that Jon borrowed the clue vocabulary too.
| Fenn poem line | Fenn community consensus | Working hypothesis for Jon's box |
|---|---|---|
| Begin it where warm waters halt | Thermal water meets cold water — top solvers pointed to Yellowstone's thermal basins. | JCB confirmed his first clue is "where cool water flows" — the inverse of Fenn's halt. Madison Junction and Colorado's Green River are the top two candidates. |
| And take it in the canyon down | A canyon below the warm-waters point — commonly the Gallatin or Madison River canyon. | Canyon imagery translates directly. A road-accessible canyon downstream of a water feature. US-191 through Yellowstone fits both. |
| Not far, but too far to walk | Between 1–10 miles from the starting clue — drive, don't hike the full distance. | The box is near road access but not at a trailhead. Jon's 'no 4WD' echoes this — drive most of the way, then a short walk. |
| Put in below the home of Brown | Brown trout → a named river stretch; Brown bear habitat; or a named Brown landmark. | Likely preserved as an animal, person's name, or landmark. The homage makes a direct named-landmark solve most probable. |
| No place for the meek | Somewhere off the main tourist path — not roadside, requires intent. | Jon's 'no 4WD but might be bumpy' is the same constraint. A short rough trail, not a trailhead parking lot. |
| There'll be no paddle up your creek | A creek too shallow or steep to paddle — Fenn's community focused on small feeder creeks off the Madison or Gallatin drainages. | A named small creek off a larger river system. The creek identifies the specific drainage. |
| If you've been wise and found the blaze | A physical mark on tree, rock, or structure — some read this as a Forest Service trail marker. | Jon almost certainly has a 'blaze' equivalent. In mountain terrain: a cairn, carved mark, painted blaze, or distinctive rock formation. |
Confirmed eliminations — Box 1
Only eliminations with a public source are logged. Each one here closes off real geography.
Not yet eliminated: specific mountain ranges, watershed side of the divide, elevation sub-ranges within 5,000–10,200 ft, state (MT vs WY vs N-NM).
Candidate locations — evidence matrix
Four candidate locations scored across 8 evidence criteria (0 = no evidence → 3 = strong match).
| Location | WWWH | Canyon | Brown | Elev. | Road | Blaze | Comm. | JCB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Glenwood Canyon
Colorado · I-70
|
3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 |
|
Brown's Park
Colorado · CO/UT border
|
2 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
|
Madison Valley
Wyoming · W. Yellowstone
|
3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
|
Glacier area
Montana · speculative
|
1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
- The book: There's Treasure Inside by Jon Collins-Black, 2024-11-12.
- Jon's official site: treasureinside.com — rules, status, key hints.
- Mysterious Writings (Jenny Kile): mysteriouswritings.com — most disciplined community index.
- r/TheresTreasureInside: active Reddit community. Higher noise; treat alternate theories as hypothesis.
- Seth Gould (metalsmith): Lion's Share container at sethgould.com .
How we'll work this
- Eliminations with sources only — interview clip, podcast timestamp, Jon's posts.
- Areas, not points — a hypothesis is a polygon plus a justification.
- BOTG writeups stay private — no candidate pins on the public page.
Facts from public interviews, the book, and community write-ups · Unofficial commentary