S03 Episode 11 Extra: Hare Raising

treasure hunts of all time. We might also say that what has played out on that island in the one hundred and twenty odd years since the pit's discovery is nothing less than the story of humankind, of land and lives destroyed on a promise of riches. The beguiling Oak Island Mystery put me in mind of another much publicized as your Hunt, of an eminently more gentle variety, though it is a story no less interesting because of it.

It began in nineteen seventy six with a request from publishing agent Tom Maskler to the then thirty year old artist Kit Williams to put together a picture book. Though Williams was open to the idea, he didn't want to create something that would just be flipped through by the reader, with his art being treated as something incidental, and so he hashed a plan. He accepted Mascula's offer on one condition that he be allowed to do something that no

one had done before. Over the next few years, Williams developed the story and set to work on the sixteen paintings that would help to tell it. He gave it the title Masquerade. After completing the material, Williams, also an expert metal worker, retired to his craft studio, whereafter tinkering away for a few days, he crafted an ornate pendant made of eighteen carrot gold, fashioned into the shape of a hare and adorned with ruby, turquoise and mother of pearl.

This was to be the center of his plan. Once finished, the pendant was set into wax to preserve it before being deposited in a ceramic bowl, on which was written the words I am the keeper of the Jewel of Masquerade, which lies waiting safe inside me for you or eternity. Some time later, one night in the summer of nineteen seventy nine, Williams and a friend drove out to a secluded patch of England where under the light of the moon, they dug a small hole. Into this, the hare, encased

in its ceramic container, was deposited and covered over with earth. Finally, on the eve of publication a few days later, Williams made the enigmatic announcement to the world that contained within the pages of his new book were all the clues any reader would need to find the location of the buried treasure. The story of Masquerade was a simple one. It told the tale of a hare called Jack, who was given a golden ornament by the Moon to deliver as a gift to the Sun. Only when Jack reaches

the Sun, he discovers he has lost the ornament. It was down to the reader to find it again. However, it wasn't in the text so much that the clues were hidden, but rather among the sixteen exquisite paintings that Williams had created, meaning, as had been his plan all along, readers would be forced to study his work like never before in order to crack the code. On the first day, the book sold fifty thousand copies, sending the publisher into a spin as they tried to keep up with demand.

The following day, it was another fifty thousand copies, and by the end of the week a quarter of a million copies of the book had been sold, and not long after came the letters. Are you always taking care of your family? Do you often take care of others and not yourself? Now it's time to take care of yourself. To make time for you. You deserve it. Tele Adoc gives you access to a licensed therapist to help you get back to feeling your best to feeling like yourself again.

With tele adoc, you can speak to a licensed therapist by phone or video. Therapy appointments are available seven days a week from seven a m. To nine pm local time. If you feel overwhelmed sometimes maybe you feel stressed or anxious, depressed or lonely, or you might be struggling with a personal or family issue, teledoc can help. Teledoc is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches, so they make it easy to change counselors if needed. For free teledoc therapy is

available through most insurance or employers. Download the app or visit teledoc dot com Forward slash Unexplained podcast today to get started. That's teladoc dot com slash Unexplained podcast To avoid treasure hunters unnecessarily carving up the British isles. Williams had encouraged readers to write to him with their answers, whereupon he would call them back if they had solved

the puzzle correctly. Soon he was receiving thousands of letters on a weekly basis, but whether he got back to readers or not, it did little to stop the more adventurous from putting their theories to the test, with some traveling from as far as Japan, Germany and the United

States in the quest to uncover the hair. Some even turned up at William's door begging him for more clues, but as the months went by, some grew skeptical that there was even a puzzle to be solved, or that at the very least, there would be no treasure to be found at the end of it. Publisher Tom Maskler received one letter from a reader convinced he had uncovered the ruse, believing there was no such person as artist Kit Williams since his name was an anagram for I

will mask it. It was over two years later when Williams's wife Elaine, headed downstairs one morning to collect the latest batch of posts in amongst the bills and the mound of letters from people who regularly wrote in she came across one envelope that was unlike any of the others. Intrigued, she took it upstairs and handed it to Kit to open. Inside he found a letter, as well as a series of small sketches, including one of a monument underneath which

they had drawn across. Kit recognized it as the place where he had buried the treasure. Using the phone number that had been included, Kit Julie gave the mysterious reader a call. Moments later, he was speaking to a softly spoken man with a croaky voice, who introduced himself as Ken Thomas. Although Kit was relieved that the puzzle had finally been sold, he was a little disappointed to discover that Ken had apparently only managed to partially solve it

before he found the location. Perhaps more unexpected. However, he didn't even seem that happy that he had done it, being reluctant as he was to go back to the site and dig up the hair since he was suffering from a slight cold. As for the puzzle itself, Kit believed he had set it up in such a way that it was virtually impossible to solve it without all the information. If anything, it was almost impossible either way.

Each of the books sixteen pictures were formed of a central picture bordered by a cryptic set of words, some letters of which were painted red or had a line drawn across them. Selecting each of these letters would reveal two more words. In each of the pictures were also to be found the image of a hair, often hiding within it, as well as a number of other animals. Some pictures also included number sets, and all were covered in symbolism, where even the positioning of limbs could have

a double meaning taken in its entirety. These clues, of which many were red herrings, did provide significant hints as to the location of the treasure. But the big piece that most failed to work out was that by drawing a line from the eye of any living animal depicted in a painting through its corresponding hands and feet would reveal another set of words. Taken together, they gave the phrase Catherine's long finger overshadows, earth, buried, yellow, amulet, midday

points the hour in light of equinox. Look You. Then, by taking the first letter of each word, you found another line close by Ampthill, a market town in the County of Bedfordshire in southern England. Ken Thomas had done none of this. Instead, he claimed to have first deduced that the location had something to do with King Henry the Eight's first wife, Catherine of Arragon, before later hitting upon the town of Ampthill from other clues in the book.

On a whim, he had traveled to the town one morning with his dog and ended up walking in Ampthill Park, a large country estate on the edge of the town. It was here that his dog ran off ahead towards a cross monument, where it promptly urinated. When Thomas caught up with it, he found, to his surprise that the monument was dedicated to Catherine of Arragon. Realizing he had found the location of the Golden Hair, he promptly wrote

his letter and sent it off to Williams. Thomas would eventually claim his prize in March nineteen eighty two, and later meet Williams and some photographers in Amphill Park for a series of publicity shots. However, eager to maintain his anonymity, Thomas strangely wore a disguise throughout and that as bizarre as it sounds, was that, or so it was thought. Five years later, in nineteen eighty four, a computer game

called Hair Raiser was released onto the market. Only it wasn't a game as such, but a treasure hunt, whereby the treasure was the same golden hair that had been found by Ken Thomas five years previously. The game's creators, Dougald Thompson and John Guard, claimed to have come into possession of the pendant a few years earlier and decided

to use it again for their own venture. The game, which was sold in two parts at almost five times the value of the original book, was composed of a series of static screens showing a variety of images and occasional text. It soon became clear to those unlucky enough to have purchased it, however, that the puzzle was probably unsolvable,

and as a result, the game failed to sell. The existence of the prize, however, was genuine enough, although rather than giving it to a lucky winner, Thompson and Guard were forced to have it sold at Sotherby's auction house in nineteen eighty eight when their company went into liquidation. It would eventually sell for thirty one thousand pounds equivalent to eighty thousand pounds today. And then in December that year,

something unexpected came to light. Although it was thought that a man called Ken Thomas had successfully discovered Kit Williams's golden hair, in truth there was no Ken Thomas. Thomas was in fact dugal to Thompson, the maker of Hair Raiser, as revealed in a Sunday Times expose. As it turned out, his business partner, John Guard's girlfriend, Veronica Robertson, had once been Kit Williams's girlfriend. More to the point, she had been his girlfriend when he conceived the puzzle for Masquerade

and knew roughly where the treasure was buried. Robertson was convinced by Guard to give up the location on the promise that he would donate the treasure to an animal rights charity. He did no such thing. Kit Williams was understandably devastated when he heard the news, as were two

young physics teachers, Mike Barker and John Rousseau. Barker and Rousseau were the only people to successfully solve the puzzle in its entirety, and had traveled to Ampthill only days before Dugald Thompson went looking for the hare, only to miss uncovering it by inches. In fact, Thompson later said it was only because of Barker and Rousseau's dig marks that he realized he was looking in the right place. Next week's episode twelve will be the final episode of

season three. However, we will return in mid November twenty eighteen for season four. If you enjoy listening to Unexplained and would like to help support us, you can now go to Unexplained podcast dot com forward slash support. All donations, no matter how large or small, are massively appreciated. All elements of Unexplained are produced by me, Richard mcclained smith. Please subscribe and rate the show on iTunes. Feel free to get in touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding

the stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation of your own you'd like to share. You can reach us online at Unexplained podcast dot com or on Twitter at Unexplained Pod. Now it's time to take care of yourself. To make time for you, teledoc gives you access to a licensed therapist to help you get back to feeling your best. Speak to a licensed therapist by phone or video anytime between seven am to nine pm local time, seven days a week. Teledoc Therapy is

available through most insurance or employers. Download the app, or visit teledoc dot com Forward slash Unexplained podcast Today to get started. That's t e ladoc dot com Slash Unexplained Podcast