Original subtitles

Tonight on The Curse of Oak Island...

The 90 Foot Stone is

- ‐the most important artifact. - Rick, look at this one.

- I think we found it. - Yeah.

- Whoa! - The Eye of the Swamp

is connected to the paved area.

‐ ‐Ooh! Look at that!

That is a really old tunneling tool.

That's awesome!

Holy crow!

‐What the heck is it? ‐This is old.

We found the smoking gun. The paved area is man‐made.

All right!

There is an island in the North Atlantic

where people have been looking for an incredible treasure

for more than 200 years.

So far, they have found a stone slab

with strange symbols carved into it,

mysterious fragments of human bone,

and a lead cross whose origin may stretch back

to the days of the Knights Templar.

To date, six men have died trying to solve the mystery.

And, according to legend,

one more will have to die

before the treasure can be found.

Look at that.

Isn't that remarkable?

Yeah.

Tell me that's natural.

There's no way that's natural, Rick. Look at it.

It's just layered right on top.

For brothers Rick and Marty Lagina

and their team, the historic discovery

of a massive, paved‐stone walkway in the Oak Island swamp

has offered what could be their greatest breakthrough yet

in their quest to solve a 225‐year‐old treasure mystery.

One they are eager to share

with fellow landowner Tom Nolan,

whose father, Fred Nolan, spent over five decades

tirelessly investigating the area.

It was Fred's belief that not only was the swamp man‐made,

but that the keys to finding the Oak Island treasure

were hidden beneath its murky surface.

Strange‐looking.

And I don't know what... what purpose?

I mean, it's not a drain system.

No. Too shallow for that. ‐Yeah.

And it's so uniform.

It's just perfectly flat.

Let's go down and have a little closer look at it.

All right.

The paved stone area is of

significant interest, and the more we dig,

the more impressive that structure becomes,

and there has to be a reason as to the why.

And what is its purpose?

Look, look. The water's washing that all off.

‐It's all, like, little stone placed on big stone? ‐‐

A lot of it's the same type of rock, isn't it?

It is. A lot of it is this.

Ooh. ‐It's graywacke.

I can't believe you guys found this.

It's like you're standing on a paved road

in the middle of the bog.

It's certainly wide enough.

Yeah. ‐I mean, it's so level.

If humans didn't do that, how is that possible?

I've seen some strange things in the swamp, but this is...

I don't know. I don't know how you explain this.

I don't, either.

I wonder what your father would have said.

He'd be amazed by this

'cause, I mean, you can't help but look at it and say,

"What the heck is it?"

Nobody knew the swamp like he did.

But he never had the ability to do this to the swamp, so,

you know, this is taking this to a whole different level,

‐what we're doing. ‐Yeah.

I think there are answers in the swamp,

but we may not be attuned as of yet to those answers.

I.e., is there some grand scheme

larger than what we had at first anticipated

about Oak Island?

Some sort of really intricate and involved mystery

that surpasses the so‐called Money Pit?

Um, it's possible.

I always said it was worked,

somebody worked the swamp.

Well, you look at this, pretty hard to say

‐somebody didn't work the swamp. ‐Pretty hard to say. Yeah.

But to what end? Like you say,

it's the questions it leaves behind.

I think, let's try

to get Dr. Spooner to take a look at it in the dry.

Yeah, take a look at the face and see what he thinks of it.

What is going on here?

None of it makes any sense.

Following his meeting with Tom Nolan at the swamp...

Doug and I made a little road trip

to Fortress Louisbourg...

...Rick has called his brother Marty

and other members of the team to the war room

to share important information

that he and Oak Island historian Doug Crowell

found during their recent trip

to an 18th‐century French fortress.

One of the reasons for going to Louisbourg was that

we would see some semblance of

any structure that looks like the structures on Oak Island.

Those buildings‐‐ the‐the ancillary features,

the tunnels under the earth‐‐ I mean, it was remarkable to see

‐what they had accomplished. ‐Yeah.

One week ago,

after the team obtained scientific proof

that the wooden structure recently unearthed

at Smith's Cove was built in 1741...

Pretty impressive.

...Rick and Doug traveled some 300 miles northeast

to an 18th‐century French military fort

in the town of Louisbourg.

The data supported a theory presented earlier this year

by naval historian Chipp Reid,

who believes that a vast French treasure

may have been moved from the fortress to Oak Island

during the early 1740s.

Rick, come look at this one.

Incredibly, it was while touring the fortress

that Rick and Doug were shown a centuries‐old,

stone‐paved flooding system, one eerily similar

to the possible pathway that the team has just uncovered

in the Oak Island swamp.

So, we have a few pictures of what we saw up there.

As we were being shown around,

Rick had asked if there was any part of the fortress

‐that was original, that wasn't a recreation. ‐‐

And this particular corner of the inner courtyard

was original,

and inside this particular room,

this is what the floor looked like.

- Wow. - That's interesting.

This whole system seemed to be drainage.

There was an actual small tunnel

that went out under the rock wall.

So, there's another picture of the floor.

- The rocks, though... - The rock, yeah.

MARTY ...are very similar to our paved area.

- Yeah. - Yes.

Well, don't we have multiple layers like this

actually stacked on top of each other?

We‐we do have multiple layers here. Now this,

you know, from what we could tell, was only one layer,

‐but they were far from an even floor. ‐

But that was probably the closest thing we saw to

‐our paved area. ‐Yeah.

- ‐That is close. - Yeah.

Could Rick and Doug

have discovered a link

between the 18th‐century French fortress

and a massive engineering effort

that took place in the swamp centuries ago?

And if so, could it be further proof

that the swamp may have been artificially created,

and possibly used to hide a stolen treasure ship,

as the late Fred Nolan believed?

What's this?

This is an historic photo the historian provided us

that just shows a platform of rocks on top of the soil.

This floor is several stones deep,

and that is original construction.

That's the way it was in the day.

Yeah, looks just like it.

Yeah.

That's remarkable.

Yeah.

All right. Well, cool. I mean, I‐I find that

to be very interesting, actually.

‐Yeah. ‐MARTY; You know, we're supposed to be

looking around to figure out the significance of 1741.

‐Yeah. ‐If the French were here

for some repository, and they were using the same technique

for a paved area for purposes unknown,

- ‐well, that fits. - Absolutely.

So, as we were being shown around,

we came into their armory.

And there are some cannonballs there in the background.

‐ But look at the size of that cart.

That's one of the things I know

we had some discussions here about‐‐ the paved area

‐there be too rough for a cart. ‐Would have to be big wheels.

- ‐Yeah. - These are big wheels.

‐These wheels are probably five feet tall. ‐

See, look how big those carts were

that were in use in that time period.

That cart. Maybe they used carts here?

- ‐Yeah. - That would make sense

that somebody would use carts

like that to cart something,

whether it be depositor, I don't know.

The floor in Louisbourg looks identical

to our paved area out here in the swamp.

I mean, I'd say virtually identical.

‐Pretty much. ‐And what else did he find?

That‐that the sort of transportation of the day

involved using these big wheeled carts.

They would function beautifully

on a cobbly thing like we found in the swamp.

I think that these paved areas

in the swamp and the paved areas in the fort

are eerily similar, and... I've‐I've got my toes tingling.

I want to get out there and go metal‐detect it.

I‐I was just thinking you want to get back

‐to metal detecting, so, let's call it. ‐Yeah.

Good trip, you guys. Excellent data.

Following their meeting

in the Oak Island war room...

Hello! ‐Hey.

...Rick Lagina and Billy Gerhardt return to the swamp,

where they are joined by geoscientist Dr. Ian Spooner.

They are eager for Dr. Spooner

to examine the mysterious paved area now that

it has been more fully drained,

in the hopes of finding any evidence

that might help determine when the structure was built

and for what purpose.

Holy crow!

What are we looking at?

I think something really important here.

The key thing is, I need to find wood

around the rocks, and I need to have

an indication that the rocks were interacting with the wood.

‐So, you see this stick here, right? ‐‐

‐And you see this rock here. ‐‐

And so, if we move this rock away,

what's happened to the stick?

Yeah, it's squished.

It's smashed by the rock.

You see how it fit right like that?

So, what that tells me is that

these rocks couldn't have been laid down by a glacier.

‐Right? ‐Why not?

Because you wouldn't have a stick. No trees.

‐No wood. ‐Right.

And that can't be done by anything natural.

So, the contention that this is some kind

of placed stone platform,

I don't think there's any question.

- ‐Really? - Yeah, yeah.

I guess

I'm a little bit happy that the swamp

really did yield something significant

because I put everybody through the gristmill

about, "It's not over. We've got to keep looking."

And now it...

it turns out that, you know,

there's some interesting data there.

Now, I'm going to ask you the‐the question

I always ask Gary Drayton.

What's your... what's your guess? How old?

When was this work done?

It's not Mr. Nolan's time.

It's not Mr. Blankenship's time.

It's way before that time.

It's old, it's old, it's old.

Here's the thing.

This certainly predates the discovery story, right?

‐Yeah. ‐And the discovery story

‐essentially predates habitation here. ‐Yeah.

- ‐Yeah. - So,

who did it and why?

To me, here's the key.

This stick will tell me when that stone was placed.

If you date the stick, you know when that happened.

Finding evidence

that the mysterious paved stone path is,

in fact, a man‐made structure,

one possibly built

prior to the discovery of the Money Pit in 1795,

is an exciting development.

If Dr. Spooner's assessment can be confirmed

through further scientific analysis,

the team may be one step closer to dating

this potentially ancient construct.

Dr. Spooner has

"found the smoking gun."

The paved area is man‐made.

This is probably... Well, I won't say

it's the most important discovery on Oak Island,

but it certainly is up there.

The swamp is proving to be more interesting

and more, enigmatic

than, perhaps, even the Money Pit.

You know what? I'm in awe.

The work you've done and continue to do...

All we can do is say thank you.

But we very much look forward to that date, certainly.

I know that Marty and Craig... All of us are really...

are gonna be very interested in that date.

But we've got a lot of work ahead of us, Bill.

- Yeah. Yeah. No problem. - Thank you.

Appreciate all the help.

One day after obtaining scientific evidence

that the paved stone area

is a potentially ancient, man‐made feature,

Jack Begley

and metal detection expert Gary Drayton,

along with heavy equipment operator Billy Gerhardt,

are eager to resume digging near the mysterious structure

to see where it might lead.

You have to define the area,

the‐the complete extent of the paved area.

Otherwise, it's just patchwork guesswork.

We have to know its exact physical dimensions

because Dr. Spooner is proposing

that it predates the discovery of the Money Pit.

- ‐Hey, Billy. - Hey, Gary.

So, what's the plan for today? These spoils?

Yeah. We'll work at these spoils and try

to see if we can find the extent of the paved area.

If you do a little area,

I'll pull it back, and then we‐we'll keep moving.

Right on, mate.

As Billy carefully excavates the area,

Gary Drayton will search the spoils

with a metal detector

for any important clues or artifacts.

We got to find some metals today.

Yeah, this looks natural.

It's just clay.

So, when you dig down into it, there's no rocks.

If you want to check right here, Gary,

then I'll peel that down. Maybe we'll dig another hole.

Okay.

Nothing here, mate.

Yeah, take it a little bit further.

It's a unique opportunity

to metal detect around this paved area.

My theory is

that this was used

as a place to load and unload things,

and it's a great place to trap coins and artifacts.

Anything lost in that area

is still gonna be there.

Where are the rocks?

There's not much of that up here.

It's just mostly small sticks.

It's falsing off some twigs.

Yeah.

You keep digging this out, mate.

Check all this, Gary? ‐Yep.

Whoa! Do you see that?

Finally!

That's awesome.

If you look in the end of the hole,

it looks like rocks on top of rocks there, right?

Yeah, it does look stacked there, Billy.

We might have to jump down and...

you know, sort of, like, clean the side off.

Scrape it off a little bit?

Sure.

‐ You don't have to say that twice, Billy.

Jack's down there.

See, the‐the rock where your shovel just touched,

Jack, is suspended by the other rock, right?

Yeah. Yeah, they're laid on top

of the natural layer.

I also notice there's vegetation,

as in wood branches

on top of the rocks but not below them.

They were put there a long, long time ago.

That's probably a continuation

‐of the paved area, by the look of it. Yeah.

Could it be

that the paved stone area is even larger

and extends much further than previously thought?

You look at the area

of the paved area, and it's not just

what we defined it as. It looks like

it extends out even further.

And there's got to be a reason for it,

cause it's been buried in the swamp

for at least a couple hundred years.

So, what are all these rocks doing here,

and why are they so even? Why is it level?

There's so many other questions.

It does look very similar,

but we got to dig up more of the area.

Yeah.

We'll have to dig up a little bigger spot.

- ‐Yeah. - Yeah.

Okay. Let's keep going, then.

Something went on in this area.

We should see if we can

- ‐find the edge where... - Yeah.

If it's extended into land,

- ‐try to see where at. Yeah. - Right.

We could make a hole just up‐up here

to see if it exists.

After hearing

that Jack, Gary and Billy have unearthed

more of the mysterious paved stone structure,

Rick Lagina, Craig Tester and surveyor Steve Guptill

arrive at the Oak Island swamp

to inspect their progress firsthand.

Craig, you got a good look at the other

‐stone structures over there, right? ‐Yeah.

You can see there's‐there's rocks here.

It's a little muddy,

but it would resemble

over on this side.

You can see the normal gray clay,

and then you had orange under it.

Then you got all these big rocks stacked on top.

Steve,

can you get down there and take an elevation

and see if it mimics that?

Yeah.

That there is a foot below sea level.

And the paved area's

two feet, on average, below.

- ‐Quite consistent. - This, definitely,

I would say, is very much like that.

It's got that raw profile.

Take your bar and just probe right there.

Yeah. There's...

There's rocks there.

I'd be interested to know

how far out in this direction this paved area goes

towards the Eye of the Swamp.

Maybe the Eye of the Swamp

is connected to this paved area.

Here we go.

While probing near the apex

of the triangle‐shaped swamp earlier this year...

‐ ‐That's solid.

‐Yeah, that's a good one. ‐...Marty Lagina

and members of the team discovered

an unusual circle of stones, which the team

has dubbed the Eye of the Swamp.

It is a formation

that they believe could represent

the so‐called all‐seeing eye,

a prominent symbol for both the Freemasons

and their predecessors, the Knights Templar.

But could this mysterious feature

and the paved stone area really be connected?

And, if so, for what purpose?

From a mid location on the paved area

to the Eye is 150 feet.

So, I don't know if that's a correlation.

But when we were out there,

the rocks just feel similar.

This is the type

of formations we're looking for

to show us of human activity.

And as long as we continue to dig,

hopefully they dropped something like in Smith's Cove.

There's a good chance

around here there's gonna be

some sort of indication of who built it.

I'm hoping it's a yellow brick road.

Golden brick road.

We need to start

remediating some of these areas, so, Billy,

as you walk the excavator out, you can level that area off.

And then, hopefully, the most interesting thing

still lies in front of us. So...

Got a lot of work to do. We better get after it.

‐All right, mate. ‐Okay.

Later that same day,

as the investigation at the swamp continues...

Hey, Terry.

‐Hi, guys. How you doing? ‐Good, good.

Craig Tester joins

Oak Island historian Charles Barkhouse

and geologist Terry Matheson at the Money Pit area

to resume the core drilling operation

near the site of Shaft Two.

The shaft, which was constructed

just 14 feet from the Money Pit by searchers in 1805,

featured a horizontal tunnel at a depth of 110 feet

which collapsed from flooding just two feet

from the location of the original treasure shaft.

‐Whoa! ‐We got some wood here.

Whoa!

How 'bout that?

While drilling

at this same site two weeks ago,

Marty and members of the team

discovered unusual ax‐cut wood

at a depth of 106 feet.

- ‐That's very old. - Yeah.

Think maybe we're just skimming down

the outside of the potential Money Pit shaft.

While they are

currently awaiting test results

on that wood sample,

Craig and the team are continuing to drill

in the hopes that the next core they bring to the surface

may have hit the Money Pit itself

and the fabled treasure vault.

We are at G10.5, which puts us...

right there.

We're very close to the center, so...

- Yeah. - What we're looking for

is the Money Pit.

If Shaft Two,

which we feel we found here, and the tunnel comes here,

14 foot puts it in this area somewhere.

Yep. ‐And so we're looking

just west of there.

And we're just about five feet

from where we found the wood that we thought

might've been the wall of the re‐cribbed Money Pit.

Yeah.

So, anyway, there it is.

How deep are we going with this one, Craig?

We'll follow this down to 110 feet.

It's what we get below that that really matters, so...

That‐That's when it's gonna get interesting. Yeah.

- Knock on wood. - It's what we want to find.

Yeah.

Whoa!

Easy!

Wonder how far that went.

Well, this'll be interesting,

'cause it should've cored.

Okay. Where's it all fit in?

I started coring at 109,

and I cored it to 119

and it didn't feel like hardly any resistance.

News that the sonic drill bit has begun advancing faster

and much easier through the earth

is a potentially significant development,

one that could mean that the team has intercepted

an open void or cavern deep underground.

Let's go with that, then.

Your feeling is that might be in and around 120, right there?

I'd say 125.

What you thinking, boss?

I'm thinking probably undisturbed.

This is massively bedded,

limestone‐rich,

you know, crumbly material.

It is never gonna hold together.

So, this is not fill, right?

No, this is not fill.

This is, ‐‐ There's‐‐

You can see primary bedding there.

It's not the original Money Pit if we're in virgin ground.

Yeah.

The bad news is

it can't be... the Money Pit.

‐Yeah. ‐But it being very loose

and drilling so easily, um,

we've got to be near something,

whether it's the‐the Money Pit

or something that‐that's loosened up the ground.

Yeah.

Although the core sample

the team has obtained contains undisturbed soil,

indicating they have missed the original Money Pit,

it is Craig and Terry's assessment

that the loose earth they are drilling through

is due to past human activity nearby,

meaning their target could be just inches away.

We might as well stop here and move over

‐a foot and a half or so. ‐Okay.

Okay. Let's see what happens.

As a new day begins,

Rick Lagina and members of the team

have traveled some 52 miles northeast

of Oak Island to the Dartmouth Heritage Museum

in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.

Can you think of a better day to try and solve

the mystery of the 90 Foot Stone?

I'm hoping the first bucket finds it.

They are eager to follow up on a tip

Rick received earlier this year

from area resident Kevin Rideout

concerning the possible whereabouts

of the legendary 90 Foot Stone.

Discovered in 1804 by members of the Onslow Company

when they excavated the original Money Pit

down to the 90‐foot level,

the stone was reported to be a flat, olive‐colored slab

carved with strange, rune‐like symbols.

Although later translated to read "Forty feet below

two million pounds are buried,"

there are some who believe that these symbols

could be coded instructions on how to shut off

the booby traps that feed seawater into the Money Pit.

Unfortunately, no photographs or rubbings

of the carvings were ever taken,

and the stone itself has been missing

for more than 100 years.

We looked out from that window,

and it was pointed out to me

this side of the rhododendron, right here.

But according to Kevin Rideout,

the stone was shown to him over 40 years ago

while visiting the Dartmouth Heritage Museum,

where it was reportedly embedded in the yard

behind the property.

‐Let's get started. ‐Yeah.

Having just obtained a government permit to dig

on the museum grounds,

Rick and the team are hopeful

they will finally recover what could be

one of Oak Island's most important artifacts.

Hey, Bill.

I'd dig up what we talked about, maybe a 20 by 20.

‐Yeah. ‐You know, I mean,

we'll want a good understanding

of what‐what the ground looks like.

‐Okay? ‐Yeah.

While Rick and the team

begin their search,

Jack Begley and metal detection expert

Gary Drayton are beginning to search near

the so‐called Eye of the Swamp

for any important clues or artifacts.

‐ ‐Got a target, mate.

Right in there.

Ooh, I like this matrix.

Nice and thick.

Thick enough to trap good coins and artifacts.

I think I got it.

Yeah. It's moving.

Ooh!

‐Wait. ‐Now, look at that!

That is a really old pick.

You don't think that this is Fred Nolan's?

No, I don't think it's Fred Nolan's,

'cause it is fairly chunky.

It's old, because it's so heavy.

And, look, a more modern one would be more round.

This is that nice oval shape.

‐‐ ‐Because back in the day,

they would have a wooden...

handle, and they would shave it down.

Wouldn't be like a machine‐made, round one.

And this is cool.

It's got that‐‐

The‐the tines

or the picks are really short,

so you would have used this for tunneling.

'Cause you know what a big old pickax is like.

Normally, it's got two really big

‐pick parts to it. ‐‐

This hasn't.

This is more of a‐a tunneling tool.

An old iron pickax

possibly used for tunneling

and found near the Eye of the Swamp?

- Dry. - It's very tight.

Earlier this year,

while investigating a 200‐foot‐long anomaly

detected by seismic scanning,

the Oak Island team obtained core samples

of unusually hard‐packed clay

up to 40 feet deep in the swamp,

creating ideal conditions for tunneling beneath the area.

Interestingly enough,

you probably could tunnel through this stuff.

‐Right? ‐Yeah. No question.

‐You could. ‐Yeah.

There has been talk of tunnels in the swamp,

like some kind of back entry to the Money Pit.

Well, if you're gonna be digging in the swamp and tunneling,

you would need a little tunnel pick

like the pick that Jack and I just pulled out of this hole.

What the heck is this tunneling pick doing over here?

We're so far away

‐from the Money Pit. ‐Yeah.

Who's been tunneling or digging round here?

‐It's an artifact that we can have tested... ‐Yeah.

...and see how it lines up with all the other artifacts

we found in the swamp this year.

Set that down somewhere safe,

and we'll see if there's anything else in the hole.

‐ ‐There is.

Dig that sucker out, Jack.

If I can get it out of there.

I got to actually grab it.

The heck is that?

I don't know.

Looks like a...

It could be anything, couldn't it?

‐Could be, like, an old bucket. ‐

It does kind of look like an old...

‐spade. ‐It does, doesn't it?

‐Yeah. ‐It looks‐‐ You know what,

‐that's a‐‐ Yeah. ‐Like a round point spade.

Look.

‐Yeah. ‐Good eye, Jack. Yeah.

It is an old spade.

But it's a‐another tool.

And i‐if you look at this and you compare it

‐to that modern one... ‐A second digging tool

‐over here! ‐Yeah.

We're in the old toolshed, mate.

But a toolshed from the 1700s.

A round point spade

dating back to the 1700s

and found alongside an old iron pickax in the swamp?

Could Jack and Gary have found further evidence

to support the notion

that a large‐scale tunneling operation

took place in this area centuries ago?

And if so, could it also be connected in some way

to both the mysterious paved area

and the Eye of the Swamp located nearby?

We should take it to Carmen Legge.

Yeah. I think he's gonna be excited about that.

And you know what? We ain't finished shopping yet.

‐I just think we're gonna keep finding stuff in here. ‐Yeah.

Let's see if there's anything else in the area.

Later that day,

back at the Dartmouth Heritage Museum,

Rick and members of the team

continue to dig in search of the 90 Foot Stone.

The last four or five buckets,

we've hit bricks.

That's not why we're here, so... keep going.

‐ ‐BILLY: Rock there.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Hang on.

Let's see if that's flat or not.

It feels flat, but I don't want to scratch it. Right there.

Whatever that is, it's been in there for a while.

Wow.

It's squared off.

It's flat on that face.

It's not bad.

- ‐It fits, right? - Well, it's...

that's the area we'd exp... we wanted to find it, right?

While excavating the grounds

of the Dartmouth Heritage Museum

in search of the legendary 90 Foot Stone,

Rick Lagina and members of the Oak Island team

have just unearthed an unusually flat rock slab.

It's definitely green.

Yeah.

- ‐It's got a square corner. - Yeah.

Dig it out. See what it looks like.

Nah, it's too big.

It had some promise when you first started clearing...

cleaning it off, 'cause it did look quite flat.

Yep.

According to Oak Island legend,

after the 90 Foot Stone was discovered

and removed from the original Money Pit in 1804,

treasure hunter John Smith,

one of the three young men who first discovered

the treasure shaft in 1795,

mounted the stone into the fireplace of his home

as a decoration.

In 1865, it was removed

and transported some 60 miles north

to the city of Halifax,

where it was put on display in the window

of the A & H Creighton bookbindery

in the hopes of attracting new investors

to the Oak Island treasure hunt.

However, after the bookbindery closed its doors in 1919,

the 90 Foot Stone vanished without a trace.

Some believed that the stone was secretly donated

to the nearby Halifax Club,

a fraternity made up of prominent businessmen,

where it was supposedly embedded into the floor.

But when, in 2016,

Alex Lagina and members of the Oak Island team

tracked down that lead, they reached a dead end.

We didn't find what we were looking for,

but I think we made some progress.

We've got some good leads to chase down.

One year ago,

Oak Island historian Doug Crowell

believed he had found the stone

in the basement of the building where it was last seen,

the site of the Halifax bookbindery.

Look! There's something carved there.

Holy smokes!

But although it did match an earlier description,

the total absence of any of the hieroglyphic markings

suggested to the team that it was not the original stone.

‐Where's all the inscriptions? Where's the writing on it?

Earlier this year, Rick Lagina received a credible tip

from area resident Kevin Rideout.

He insisted that he had seen a gray‐green stone

matching the 90 Foot Stone's description several years ago

on the grounds of the Dartmouth Heritage Museum.

Kevin.

‐Thank you for coming. Appreciate it. ‐Morning, Rick.

So, if you were looking for a general area,

from where to where do you think it might be?

Rick, I thought you'd find it right here.

You're‐you're right on the money.

You can see the elevations.

That lower grade was over here.

So somebody did a lot of work in‐filling or whatever here.

It's your suggestion, then, that...

we need to go much deeper?

Yes. Yes.

We very quickly learned

: that this is not gonna be as easy as we had thought.

And the more we dig, the more we expose,

we realize how difficult this enterprise is gonna be.

But we're not gonna give up.

Ooh. Wait, Billy. Whoa.

Nope.

After digging for several hours,

and uncovering the entire area

believed to possibly contain the legendary 90 Foot Stone,

Rick Lagina and the team have come to an unfortunate

and disappointing conclusion.

I think we've got our answer.

Not here.

Yeah, I think we exhausted that.

I hate to use the word "disappointing"

when it comes to the work we did at the museum.

We didn't find the stone,

but we did everything we could to find the stone.

We‐we followed the lead.

We dug at the site.

And we will continue to follow it.

Perhaps the trail doesn't end here.

That would be the hope. ‐‐

There's one thing that sums up everything

we, together, have attempted to do on Oak Island:

we have never, ever given up.

And we're not done here. We're not done looking.

We're not done searching. We're not done researching.

‐We're not giving up. ‐On to the next.

On to the next.

Following their investigation

in search of the 90 Foot Stone,

Rick Lagina and Doug Crowell return to Oak Island,

where they join Rick's brother Marty,

Craig Tester and other members of the team

in the war room.

They have gathered to hear a scientific report

that has just come in

concerning the strange wood sample

recovered two weeks ago

during their core‐drilling operations

in the Money Pit area.

Yeah, guys, as you'll recall, um,

in some of our test drilling,

specifically FG12,

we found some very peculiar wood,

and the reason it was peculiar is because it was at the end

of the tunnel that you guys found,

or we think, from Shaft Two.

The base of that tunnel was consistently at 103 feet,

I believe‐‐ is that right?‐‐ and this one was deeper.

It didn't look right.

It certainly had none of the characteristics

of the Hedden Shaft.

So, I mean, it was too dark.

It looked very old, so we decided to get it,

carbon‐14 dated, and Craig here has the results.

Um, definitely got good results.

It's from 1626 to 1680.

Wow.

‐I like that. ‐‐

Wood from the Money Pit area?

Dated to more than a century before the discovery

of the fabled treasure shaft?

Have Rick, Marty and the team

finally pinpointed the location

where the Oak Island treasure vault

lies buried deep below?

It's very encouraging that

the highly likely date of this wood is quite old.

In the 1600s somewhere.

We've got lots of data that says

that something substantial happened here,

maybe between 1650 and 17‐something.

And that‐‐ all that's new.

I was not a believer in that at all.

I wonder what was happening

in this area late 1600s, early 1700s.

Yeah, that's the question.

‐Can I see it? ‐Yeah, absolutely.

Well, you know what? 1680.

That's, um, Dr. Spooner's big date.

Yeah.

1680, he said with some degree of certainty,

that something went on in the Eye of the Swamp.

There's a sediment right there.

Earlier this year, after extracting core samples

from the swamp, Dr. Ian Spooner presented Rick, Marty

and the team with some astonishing data.

This is quite a provocative site.

He determined that not only was the swamp potentially created

over 800 years ago, but that significant human activity

took place in the so‐called Eye of the Swamp

sometime in the late 17th century.

I'm very confident we're looking at 1680 to 1700...

that that disturbance took place.

Really interesting.

That's his date‐‐ 1680.

Dr. Spooner said that something

of an industrial scale went on here.

‐Those dates are bloody fantastic. Yeah, those are good.

This certainly begs

for further investigation‐‐ I mean,

those outlier dates, there's no question about it.

Got to follow the clues,

‐see where they lead. ‐Yep.

This is the year!

For brothers Rick and Marty Lagina

and the Oak Island team,

obtaining hard scientific evidence

that they may have finally located the original Money Pit

is a potentially historic development.

It may no longer be a question

of where the Oak Island treasure will be found,

but rather, how deeply buried is it?

And... is it a treasure of gold and silver,

or priceless artifacts?

But as the team keeps digging,

it may be that they are forced to answer

a much more difficult question:

was the search for the Oak Island treasure

worth all the time and money

and human lives it took to find it?

Next time on The Curse of Oak Island...

I'd like to know who did it, why they did it.

- Watch yourself. - Baby.

‐No, no! ‐Whoa!

- Hey! - Whoa! Whoa!

I see a big timber down there.

Yeah. And I think this is a notch right here.

- ‐Yeah, it's a big structure. - Yeah, it's huge.

‐ ‐Got a signal over here, Jack!

We got it! All right! ‐Look!

Wow.

What's that doing in the swamp?

CAPTIONING PROVIDED BY A+E NETWORKS