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The Secret (a treasure hunt) / History
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History

Page history last edited by Oregonian 6 months, 4 weeks ago

The History Behind The Secret

 

 The Secret is a puzzle book that was published in 1982.  According to the title page, the responsibilities for the book were divided up this way:

 

Authors
Illustrators
Sculptress
Photographer
Designer
Developed and Edited by
Sean Kelly & Ted Mann John Jude Palencar, John Pierard, & Overton Loyd JoEllen Trilling
Ben Asen
Alex Jay
Byron Preiss

 

  The casques were reportedly buried by Preiss in 12 cities in the winter of 1981-82.  When the book came out in the fall of 1982, Preiss went on a book tour around the country to generate interest.  An article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on 10/25/82 focused mostly on the imaginary creatures but also gave a few details about the treasure hunt.  An article in the Chicago Tribune on 11/16/82 reported more details about the treasure hunt and the initial reaction.  (Page 1, Page 2, Page 3)  According to the article, "Preiss, 29, hid the jewels over several months as he crossed the country on other business, carrying with him a six-foot shovel and various 'disguises' that he won't discuss.  Only he knows the burial sites, and he answers every question in an interview cagily, so as not to tip his hand."

 

  Preiss seems to have given extra effort to publicizing the book in San Francisco:

 

  The first casque was found in 1983 in Chicago, Illinois.  There was an article about the discovery in the Chicago Tribune on 8/9/83.  The Cleveland casque was found in 2004.  An article about the Cleveland find was published in the The Plain Dealer Sunday Magazine on June 13, 2004.

 

 

Sean Kelly

  Sean Kelly was listed as the first author of the book, but it isn't clear whether he wrote any of the parts that contain clues to the casques.  Kelly worked for National Lampoon from 1970 to 1984.  According to his online biography in a National Lampoon fan site, "He is perhaps best known for his talents as a lyricist and poet, penning such classics as "Overdose Heaven," the James Joyce parody "Finnswake Again," and the lyrics for well over half of National Lampoon's song parodies."  Interestingly, Kelly edited a book called Irish Folk and Fairy Tales that was published in 1982, the same year The Secret came out.  Kelly is from Montreal, and he may have had a role in helping Preiss find a good hiding spot there.  Kelly now works as a visiting instructor of Humanities and Media Studies at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York.  In response to questions from searchers, Kelly has said that he had nothing to do with the hiding of the casques and that Byron did not share any of the cask information with him.

 

 

Ted Mann

  Less is known about the second author, possibly because online searches bring up several different people with the same name.  The most likely possibility is that the Ted Mann who wrote The Secret is the same Ted Mann who was once a faculty member at York University in Toronto, Ontario, and is now retired.

 

 

John Jude Palencar

  The 12 images that form the visual component of the puzzle in The Secret were painted by John Jude Palencar.  His initials can be found hidden in some, but apparently not all, of the pictures.  Palencar was originally from Cleveland and was apparently the person who first suggested to Preiss that the Greek Cultural Garden would be a good place to buy one of the casques.

  In 2014, a person claiming to be a "documentary filmmaker" posted a statement on the Q4T site saying that he had spoken with Byron Preiss's widow and that she still had the original jewels.  The post claimed that the original agreement was still in force and that Mrs. Preiss would be awarding the jewels to the finders of the remaining 10 casques.  A treasure hunter from Q4T then attempted to contact John Jude Palencar to confirm that information.  In response to the inquiry, Palencar issued the following statement:

 

Subject: Re: The Secret - Byron Preiss
From: johnjudepalencar
Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2014 17:44:54 -0400

To Whom it may concern - The information you have is false and woefully incorrect. Mrs. Priess is not honoring any treasure finds. She no longer owns the intellectual property rights. Byron Preiss Visual Publication contracts and copyrights etc... were sold in a bankruptcy sale years ago. The book is out of print. Should the new owners of the intellectual property rights resurrect this book, it will be their decision.

I cannot and will not help anyone find any treasures. I don't know where they are. So please let the treasure finding community know this fact! Let it also be know that I will not respond to any future email messages or phone calls regarding "The Secret " treasures.
 

  Editors' Note: We strongly affirm Mr. Palencar's right to privacy and we ask the treasure-hunting community to refrain from any further attempts to contact him.  For more info about "the new owners of the intellectual property rights," see below.

 

2019 Palencar Art Exhibit: People who were in Canton, Ohio between May 3 and July 21, had a chance to visit the Canton Museum of Art to see the exhibit Between Worlds.  The museum described Palencar's exhibit this way: 

 

"Between Worlds" will feature a small portion of his personal works as well as pieces that were created for various publishers. Recently he has begun to devote more time to his personal painting, examining the duality of faith, mortalty, beauty and the grotesque. His personal iconography is sometimes unsettling and always ecentric. “Between Worlds” visits this quiet twilight landscape, the origin of his work.

 

 

Byron Preiss

 The main force behind The Secret was Byron Preiss.  He developed and edited the book, buried all the casques, and kept track of the jewels.  Preiss was born in Brooklyn and spent most of his life in New York City.  Oddly, his marriage announcement in the New York Times misspelled his first name as "Bryon" all the way through.

 

  Byron Preiss died in a car accident in 2005.  An article about his death is available on the Comic Book Resources site.  Here is the obituary that was published in the New York Times:

 

Byron Preiss, 52, Digital Publishing Pioneer, Dies
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
Published: July 11, 2005
   Byron C. Preiss, an author and a publisher who specialized in illustrated books by celebrities, graphic novels and science fiction, died in a traffic accident on Saturday in East Hampton, N.Y. He was 52 and lived in Manhattan.
   Mr. Preiss was the president of Byron Preiss Visual Publications and ibooks, and was recognized as a pioneer in digital publishing. He was among the first publishers to release CD-ROM's and electronic books, said Barbara Marcus, the executive vice president of the publishing company Scholastic.
   Born in Brooklyn, Mr. Preiss graduated magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 1972 and earned a master's degree in communications from Stanford University. He produced "The Words of Gandhi," an audio book that won a Grammy Award in 1985. He was also the co-author of "Dragonworld," a novel published by Bantam Books in 1979.
   Mr. Preiss published works by celebrity authors including Jane Goodall, Billy Crystal, Jerry Seinfeld, LeAnn Rimes and Jay Leno. He was active in local charities, and was co-chairman of UJA-Federation of New York's publishing committee.
   Mr. Preiss is survived by his wife, Sandi Mendelson, and two daughters, Karah and Blaire.

 

  After Preiss's death in 2005, his company declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy and its assets were put up for auction in 2006 with a starting bid of $150,000.  It isn't clear whether the auction took place, but J. Boylston & Co. announced in December of 2006 that it had acquired the assets of the late Byron Preiss.  The jewels associated with The Secret were presumably among those assets, although that transfer has never been officially confirmed.

 

  In 2015 a new reprint of The Secret appeared on the market and it included new contact information for anyone who wanted to report finding a casque.   The contact info leads to a small New York City publishing firm called Brick Tower Press, which is a sister company to J. Boylston.  In early 2018, wiki user Kang contacted the firm and confirmed that the owner, John Colby, had purchased the assets of Byron Priess Visual Publications in the 2007 bankruptcy proceedings. (For more info, see this article: http://shelterislandreporter.timesreview.com/2013/10/08/island-profile-publisher-has-it-all-in-dering-harbor/ )

  It also isn't clear whether Brick Tower Press has the original jewels, but they say that they will "honor the award upon presentation of the casque/key."  (See email below.)  Please note that new publisher, John Colby, states that he is unable to give any guidance on the searches, because Byron Preiss was the sole person with knowledge of the solutions.

 

 

 

Hints

Over the years, Preiss apparently made several hints or direct statements about casque locations:

  • In the 1982 interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Preiss disclosed that the puzzles do not all have equal difficulty and that the difficulty level is connected to the value of the jewel, saying "The stones that are worth the most will be the hardest to find."
  • In a 2003 email, Preiss apparently confirmed that there was definitely a casque in Canada.  (This is thought to be the casque associated with Image 9, although that connection was never explicitly confirmed.)
  • Sometime around 2003, a treasure hunter using the name of "Johann" on the Q4T site sent a proposed solution to Byron Preiss.  In response, Preiss wrote "Very impressive work esp since the book is 20 years old.  I think you deserve to  know that you are correct about st. Louid,but not correct about the location.thanks for all your excellent work."  (The use of "Louid" was almost certainly a typo, given that the "D" is next to the "S" on a standard keyboard.)
  • In a 2004 email to Q4T user FRSTPRZFA, Preiss directly ruled out any casque in Central Park in New York City.  (original)
  • When Egbert, who found the Cleveland casque in 2004, met Preiss, he asked him a couple of questions. He reported on Q4T that: "Preiss was a very good poker player, and was not giving out any hints about any of the other locations. However, he did confirm my theory that the countries of origin of the faeries do connect with the sites. He also said that the pages following the verses (which make up the bulk of the book) have no connection with the puzzles, and contain no additional clues." (original | screenshot part A | screenshot part B)
  • Preiss confirmed to Egbert, the second casque-finder, that the immigration references in the book were significant. For example, the casque Egbert found was in the Greek Cultural Garden. (The jewel should have been the aquamarine though.  Preiss actually handed him the wrong one by mistake.)
  • In describing his meeting with Byron Preiss, Egbert wrote: "When Siskel and I finally met BP, he ended up taking us to the bank vault in NYC where the jewels were kept. He also said the solutions to the puzzle were in the same drawer."  (original | screenshot)
  • In a 2004 email to Q4T user Wilhouse, Preiss wrote "there is a treasure in houston. that's all i can tell you."  (This is thought to be the casque associated with Image 8.)  (original | screenshot)
  • In that same 2004 email, Preiss responded to a question about the book by giving his most cryptic clue: "after 22 years, all I can say is I."  It isn't clear what he meant by that statement and he did not respond to several emailed questions about it.  Because a sans-serif font like Helvetica displays a lower-case "L" in the same way as an upper-case "I", the quote was widely misinterpreted for many years.  But displaying the quotation in an all-caps font clearly shows that the final letter is a lower-case "L" as shown below:

    According to the recipient of the email, it appeared that Preiss's message was truncated (perhaps sent accidentally) and was not a complete sentence. (original | screenshot)
  • In a July, 2005 email (shortly before he died), Preiss responded to a question about the Children's Zoo in Houston, Texas, by saying "it would not be a waste of time to dig there, but I cannot make any guarantees whatsoever." (original | screenshot)

 

 

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Comments (5)

bf5man said

at 8:31 pm on Sep 7, 2017

If one of us has an account on the www.newspaper.com website, "Byron Preiss" appears in 34 newpaper articles between 1982 and 1984, it might be worth investigating:
https://www.newspapers.com/search/#query=%22byron+preiss%22&dr_year=1982-1984

Indigoone said

at 2:20 pm on Feb 11, 2018

Byron Preiss, was so prolific, that he had many articles written regularly regarding his work. Only a few of those were actually in reference to The Secret. I took a look at what is listed for him, and most of the articles are all interviews for books he wrote after our prior to writing The Secret. Any of the articles written specifically about the casques, book, etc., can all be found with a quick Google search (no money required).

Linda S said

at 5:36 pm on Aug 2, 2018

there is ONE person who knows the locations of the Casques per interview from Bryon on 11-16-82 states "IF i get hit by a truck or something-one person has been instructed to open the directions to the casques locked away in a bank vault. WHOM is that person...lol

Kang said

at 9:04 pm on Aug 2, 2018

HI Linda - while that may have been true at the time of that interview it was not at the time that he died, according to multiple sources. Brian and Andy - finders of the Cleveland casque in 2004 were taken by BP to that bank and the lock box. They detail this on the podcast. He had told them that the jewels and the solutions were in it. But upon opening the box, he discovered that they weren't there and mentioned to them that he'd have to locate them and put them in there. He also discovered $25,000 in savings bonds he forgot were in there. Oh, and gave them the wrong jewel. They said BP was brilliant and very nice, but got an "absent minded professor" vibe from him. Yes, that's not proof unless one chooses to believe them - but I do. In addition, his family has stated that no one has the solutions - and I personally contacted John Colby, the publisher of the reprint and he told me that the award of the jewels would be honored for any finds, but that he was unable to provide search guidance as only BP knew the solutions. All told, the circumstantial evidence seems to point to the conclusion that the ONLY way to prove any given solution is correct is to actually dig one up. (Complicated by the fact that some casques may be lost to changes over the years). Such is the nature of this particular beast it seems....

Jim B said

at 11:47 am on Jun 3, 2022

Very interesting that with the recent update to this page “ May of 1982, the San Francisco Chronicle "scooped everybody by conducting an exclusive interview"”.
Was just thinking about verse 7 and the line “ The air smells sweet”. The Japanese Version Translation hints talk about Line 2: Sweet. Usually it would mean a sweet taste, but I was told you shouldn't obsess over taste. The air smells sweet, so just like in conventional Japanese, you can think of it like "atmosphere/mood."
With that in mind the Sesame St theme song immediately came to mind…..
Now I read the “scoop” article and find out that BP was a writer for Sesame St….may not be a clue but maybe a line with a little grin/double meaning….

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