Hi there folks, this is Ken Meriden-Tarzan,
inviting you to join us here in the tack room of the Diamond Cay Ranch for another exciting tale of adventure.
I don't remember if I ever mentioned old John Foster up in Montana before,
but if I didn't, I want to make up for that today.
He and I went on a treasure hunt an expedition a while back that ended happily,
and that's enough reason to make the story unusual because very few of them do.
So lean back in your chairs and get ready for an extraordinary history of the Post Hole Bank.
From the tack room of Ken Maynard's Diamond Cay Ranch, we're bringing you stories of adventure,
stories of circus life, fascinating transcribed tales of the Old West,
where cowboys still follow the cattle trails,
stories of rodeos and parades, colorful legends of the Red Man,
hidden gold and buried treasure.
The exciting tales in the Diamond Cay are told by Hollywood's champion of western stars,
internationally famous Ken Maynard.
Now Ken has a mighty interesting western tale to tell you today, folks.
So while you're all getting settled, because you won't want to miss a word of this story,
I'd like to tell you how Ken Maynard can say hello to you personally.
Sounds exciting, doesn't it?
Just imagine hearing Ken's voice saying,
Hello Margie, or Hello Phil, or whatever your name is.
Well, that's exactly what happens when you order a Diamond Cay record album of Ken Maynard's stories.
He'll personalize them.
Tell the story especially for you and call you by name right on the record.
And wait till you see the album.
It's in full color with a picture of Ken and Tarzan right on the front.
And inside are two complete Wild West tales that you can play on your phonograph or record player any time you want.
And the first thing you'll hear is Ken Maynard calling you by name.
And say these records have pictures of Ken and Tarzan on them too.
Now send for yours right away.
Just send your name and address and a dollar bill to Records in Care of this radio station.
Can you imagine just one dollar for this rootin' tootin' western album of records?
They're standard 78 RPM speed just like mom and dad have used for years.
They're made of the finest material money can buy so you don't have to worry.
They're unbreakable and you can play them over and over again and never worry about wearing them out.
These pure vinylite records are the finest quality that money can buy.
But still you send only one dollar with your name and address to Records in Care of this station and your album will be mailed to you.
Now Ken.
Well sir folks, you know it isn't every day you run into an interesting treasure story.
It's true that there are thousands of treasures of all kinds hidden around the southwest which nobody's ever found and most of the stories are quite true.
Of course a few of the legends are just plain campfire tales and many treasures have been found and quietly taken away without anybody knowing about it.
If you stumbled onto something valuable would you rush to the newspapers? Probably not.
Many of the hidden treasures don't amount to very much as we judge things today, but anything hidden appeals to the detective instinct in all of us.
We like to solve puzzles. Most of the treasure stories are just that.
Anyway as I say it isn't often you run into a story where all the facts are clear and all you have to do is to supply one missing clue to lead you to the hidden goal.
So I was very happy some years ago to run into an old friend of mine while I was touring my Wild West show through Montana.
We stopped at Harlington on our way to Helena one night and put up at the hotel.
Long about nine o'clock came a knock at my door. I was pretty tired and hoped it was only the bellboy.
But to my surprise it turned out to be Big John Foster, an old time movie stunt writer.
I had known him years back as a daring horseman who doubled most of the dangerous stunts for movie heroes, but had lost track of him for some ten years.
Big John was just as you'd imagine him, a tall muscular fellow with a cheery disposition and a hand clasp which would crunch your bones.
I wasn't too tired to welcome Big John and we had a fine talk.
John had a reason for coming to see me. He knew I was a treasure hunter in my spare time and he had lost the treasure that he thought I might help him find.
Here's what he told me.
Seems that when he left Hollywood he went back to his father's ranch in Montana and took over the management.
When his father died he was so busy and the ranch was so profitable he forgot all about Hollywood and decided to stay there.
There was a lot of work to be done checking over the deeds, cattle accounts, water rights and so on and he spent several weeks at it.
One day he was going through an old desk, one of them roll top affairs, when he found some papers belonging to his grandfather.
In a notebook was some mysterious writing. It read, $20,000 gold deposited post hole bank, 97 North. That was all.
His father had never mentioned anything about a post hole bank that he could remember and there had never been a bank anywhere in the state with such a crazy name.
But the mention of $20,000 in gold led him to think it might mean just what it said.
Since his grandfather, who had established the ranch back in the 80s, had been a cagey old fellow,
he thought maybe it meant that some gold was hidden around the ranch somewhere and he wanted to know what I thought about it.
Well, I realized right away that here was something worth looking into.
You see, in the early days before towns and banks came along, some of the old timers had a habit of putting their money for safe keeping in a post hole.
What they would do is ride out and select a certain fence post, lift it up, dig out the earth below the hole, and put their gold down there and replace the post.
Since there were thousands of posts on the ranges, it would take a thief years to find the right one.
Nobody could know the right one except the man who had buried the gold.
If Big John's grandfather had buried $20,000 in gold in a post hole bank, then there was the clue. Plain as could be, 97 North.
The 97th post hole North. But of course, North from where? That was the question.
I asked John a lot of questions.
John, I said, are the fences in the same place today as they were when your grandfather was alive?
He shook his head. No, Ken, that's the trouble. All the fences have been changed and some have been taken out altogether.
If grandfather buried any gold, it must have been 50 or 60 years ago, and I don't see how we can find it today.
Well, here was a real problem. Where have the old fences been and what would John's grandfather have used as a starting point to begin with, counting off 97?
John, I said, I think we can figure this thing out. I don't have to be in Hellen until the day after tomorrow.
I'll come out to your place first thing in the morning, and we'll spend the day looking.
Meanwhile, you go home and hunt for anything you can find among the ranch papers which might show where the old boundary lines were.
John said he would. The next morning I saddled up Tarzan and rode out to the old Lazy X.
I sent the rest of the troop on ahead and promised I would catch up with them the next day.
Well, it was a bright morning, and when I rode up, John was out to meet me with an excited look on his face.
He had found something. I could tell. And what it was, you will learn in just a moment.
Speaking of spinning, which I wasn't exactly, you know how many miles of thread go into a K-shirt?
Well, neither do I, and really who cares as long as the shirt looks good, feels good, and wears a heck of a long time.
That's the way I feel about my K-shirt. I wear one every day as regular as clockwork, because they're so easy to slip into.
No buttons or zippers or anything. Just pull them on, and you're ready to work or play.
Now the K-shirt is cotton, like a T-shirt, and in just about the same color as desert sand,
with a big red Diamond K brand blazing across the front, and of course Tarzan and me.
We've got our pictures there too.
Well, there's the K-shirt story. If you want to join Diamond K cowboys who are wearing one,
just send your name, address, and size to K-shirts and care of this station,
and then close a one dollar bill for the folks that makes them.
The K-shirts come in sizes two, four, six, eight, ten, or twelve.
Ask mom, she'll know what size you wear, but send a day, so your K-shirt will be sent by mail direct from Hollywood right away.
Send your name, address, and size to K-shirt and care of this radio station.
Now let's get back to our story for today.
Well, sir, Big John told me he had spent the greatest part of the night searching through the old desk,
and he had come across an old map showing water holes, trees, canyons, ranch houses,
and most important, the fence lines as they were in his grandfather's day.
This was a good start. We studied the map for a long time.
The nearest fence line to the house began at the northeast corner of the feed barn.
It was the only fence which ran due north.
John, I said, let's suppose that your grandfather didn't want to bury his money too far from the house.
Let's imagine that this fence starting at the feed barn is the right one.
Then all we have to do is get a compass, allow about 25 feet between such fence posts,
and count off 97 of them to have the right spot.
John agreed that might work, but it would have to be the old feed barn as shown on the map,
one which had burned down years ago.
We found the right location and determined that the fence began at the northeast corner.
With John's compass to hold us to the right line and a long iron rod for poking into the ground,
we started out counting 97 sections of 25 feet.
It took quite a while. When we reached the end of it, we drew a big circle again, poking with the iron rod.
Well, we poked for hours.
About two feet deep, and the goal had to be below that.
It took some poking to cover the area we had marked out.
We both had blisters on our hands before many hours went by.
Just as the sun was going down and we thought we'd have to give up and recheck our map,
John poked the iron rod into something hard.
He poked again to be sure. It might be a rock, but it didn't sound like a rock.
The thump was metallic. I went over to Tarzan, got the shovel we'd brought along, and began digging.
About three feet down, my shovel hit something, and after clearing the dirt away, I brought it out.
It was an old coffee can, and inside were $250 gold pieces.
We dug further and found beneath another can with 200 more.
You can't imagine our feelings. It seemed like old Grandfather Foster was watching us and smiling his approval.
We left the iron rod to mark the spot, and loading the coffee can started home.
I tried to tell John what a rare thing it was for a treasure hunter to trace his location and find the gold all in the same day,
but John wasn't paying much attention.
He was mooning along, thinking what he would do with the money.
Not that he needed it, for he had plenty.
The lazy X was making him lots of money.
It wasn't until we got almost home when he began to talk.
Ken, he said, you know, I've been thinking. This gold came from nowhere. If it hadn't been for you, I'd have never found it myself.
I know you won't take a reward for helping me, and I don't need the money myself either.
I got all I'll ever want.
I was thinking that maybe old Grandfather Foster might like to see me doing something worthwhile with it.
I don't know anything more worthwhile than helping kids.
What would you say if I gave all of Grandfather Foster's gold to the nearest Crippled Children's Hospital?
Well, I wrote a long piece, and I admit I was too choked up to say much, but I didn't let John know it.
And when I could, I said, why, John, that's the greatest idea I ever heard.
I hope that's just what you do.
And sure enough, Big John gave all the money away to help the kids.
And now maybe you don't wonder why I think John Foster's one of the greatest guys I ever knew.
The only thing I asked him was to let me have the right to use the story on my tales and the Diamond K, which John was glad to do.
So as I told you in the beginning, it isn't every day you run into a treasure story with definite clues that works yourself out in a single day.
In fact, the tale of the Post Hole Bank is the only one I know of.
So if you're ever out riding the range and come across old fence posts, well, you never know.
That's my story for the day.
Well, Ken, that was really an amazing story, and I was mighty glad to hear it too.
You know, folks, Ken has had so many exciting adventures himself, he just never runs out of adventurous stories.
Of course, he has his favorites, and two of them are the ones he tells on his Diamond K Western album.
They're full of action and suspense, wonderful stories that you want to hear over and over again.
And you can hear them any time you want when you have this Ken Mina record album for your very own.
Now, don't forget, you can't buy these records in any store.
The only way you can get one is to send your name and address to records in care of this radio station.
And be sure to include a dollar bill.
Now, that's a mighty little price for all the fun you're going to have with this album.
And remember, it'll be personalized with Ken saying hello to you by name right on the record.
So don't wait any longer.
If you haven't already sent in or if you want another album for a gift, send the name and address the album is for and the dollar to records in care of this station.
Remember, always include the name you want on the records so Ken can say hello to you or to whoever the record is for
right on the record.
Now, let's hear from Ken again.
Well, folks, it's time to bring our story round up to a close.
This is Ken Maynard in Tarzan.
Closing up the tack room at the Diamond K Ranch until I see you next time when I'll tell you the story called Pot-A-Go.
We'll be looking for you.
And in the meantime, get your one dollar bills in the mail now for some real Western fun. So long.
You've been listening to Tales from the Diamond K, stories of adventure told by Ken Maynard and the nationally famous cowboy and Hollywood's champion of Western stars.
Tales from the Diamond K was produced and transcribed in Hollywood.