This Man Dug Up An Old Box In His Backyard, Never Expected To Uncover A Lost Treasure

Incredible | 11/28/19

While digging in his own garden, a man by the name of Matthew Emanuel found a mysterious box that didn't belong to him. Matthew and his family had lived in their home in Todt Hill, Staten Island, New York for over four years. In all that time, Matthew had never buried a box in his backyard. He had no idea how it could have ended up there.

Matthew took it upon himself to find out who the box belonged to, because he knew what he found inside needed to be returned to its rightful owner. Keep reading to find out what he found.

Nobody Knew About The Box

Bamboo Bob Finds The Box
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter

The Emanuel family's property had a substantial backyard, and in that backyard, half sticking out of the dirt, was a metal box. It was nestled in the dirt by the side of their fence. The box hadn't been moved or touched in a very long time. It was covered in rust and it appeared to be very old.

Over time, plants began to grow over the outside of the box. It was totally camouflaged in the yard.

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Meet The Emanuel Family

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The Emanuel Family In Todt Hill, Staten Island, New York
@matthewjemanuel/Twitter
@matthewjemanuel/Twitter
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This is a photo of the Emanuel family. On the left side of the photo, you can see Matthew Emanuel. He is standing next to his son and his wife. Matthew and his family moved into their home on Staten Island just over four years before this incident occurred. While they lived in the house, the Emanuel family decorated, explored, and investigated every inch of the property.

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Still, this mystery remained hidden just beneath the surface.

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A Crazy Snowstorm In 2018

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A snowstorm finally exposed the old box.
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Drew Angerer/Getty Images
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The winter of 2018 was particularly harsh. On one night, the whole Staten Island area experienced a significant snowstorm. Heavy winds caused trees lining the Emanuels' backyard fence to fall over, which actually destroyed a part of their garden.

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Once the snow melted in the spring, the Emanuel's got to work restoring their yard. They knew they couldn't leave their garden in that state, so they began thinking about doing some renovations and new outdoor landscaping.

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Now They Could See The Box

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Time To Start The Garden Redesign
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Now that the box was uncovered, the Emanuel's could actually see it from one of the windows in their family room. It was clearly visible if you went out into the backyard. The Emanuels didn't pay much attention to the box, though. They just thought that it belonged there. It didn't seem like it was that out of place.

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The Emanuels were also a very busy family, so they didn't have much time to pay attention to a strange metal box in their backyard.

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Redesigning The Garden

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They Could No Longer Ignore the Box
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The winter storm completely tore down the Emanuels' fence. Their whole garden had to be redone and redesigned. Matthew thought about working on the garden himself, but after realizing how much work that would require, he decided to hire an expert landscaper.

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Mathew started looking around online for reputable landscapers, and after a while, he found somebody who could get the job done. Matthew called and made an appointment, and that call set off an incredible chain of events.

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Meet Bamboo Bob

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Dana Foley and Bamboo Bob Foley
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This is Bamboo Bob. He's a landscaper based in New York City, although he services areas all across New York and New Jersey. Bamboo Bob's real name is Robert Foley, and Matthew thought that Bob was the perfect guy to help him redesign his garden.

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Bob has seen some pretty strange things in his line of work. Landscaping is an interesting business. He's never come across an object as strange as this metal box, though.

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How Bamboo Bob Found The Box

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Matthew Hired Bamboo Bob
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Bamboo Bob specialized in, you guessed it, bamboo. Matthew asked Bob to install a small thicket of bamboo along the side of his yard where the fence used to be.

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Bob and his crew got to work installing the new bamboo fence and as they were working, they discovered a rusted box at the side of the yard. Bob asked Matthew what the box was and how it got there. he was pretty surprised by Matthew's response.

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Matthew Thought It Was An Electrical Box Of Some Kind

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Matthew Thought It Was An Electrical Box
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Bob thought that the box was rather odd, so he mentioned it to his employer. Matthew told bob that he always assumed that the box was some kind of electrical box. Bamboo Bob knew better. He'd seen many electrical boxes in his line of work and none of them looked like that.

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Matthew couldn't have been more wrong. What was really in the box would shock everybody involved. Bob decided to investigate further. He wanted to know what the box was.

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Digging Up The Box

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The Men Dug Up The Box
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
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Bamboo Bob instructed his team to dig up the box and bring it to him. Everyone on Bob's team knew that this wasn't an electrical box. Matthew's assumption was clearly incorrect.

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The box was firmly packed into the ground, and Bob's crew had to wriggle the box in all directions to get it free. After they got it out of the ground, they decided to try to open it. Everybody wanted to see what was inside.

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It Wasn't Just A Box— It Was A Safe

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The Box Turned Out To Be A Safe
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Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
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After inspecting the box, it became clear to Matthew and to Bob that this wasn't a simple box at all. It was a safe. The box had a dial on one of its sides. When the box was half-buried in the ground, the dial wasn't visible.

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The safe had been right under their noses the whole time! Now that they knew what the box was, there was only one question left: what was inside? Matthew was anxious to find out.

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The Safe Was Really Heavy

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The Safe Was About 100 Pounds
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Matthew Emanual/Twitter
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The safe was roughly two-feet across and one and a half feet tall, weighing around 100 pounds. Despite its heavy weight, Matthew was determined to find out its contents. After all, he wasted four years not knowing a thing!

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Bamboo Bob and his team stood around the garden as they watched Matthew attempt to shift the safe around. He wanted to see if he could hear any of the safe's contents jostling around inside. He didn't get far but his efforts didn't stop there.

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They Couldn't Open The Lock

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Matthew Broke Through The Safe With A Pickaxe
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Even with all the shifting, Matthew didn't hear a thing coming from inside the safe. That didn't necessarily mean it was empty, though. With the help of his landscaping team, he hoisting the safe up to the deck for further inspection.

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The landscapers then went back to work reconstructing the garden while Matthew concocted a plan. He grabbed a pickaxe and smashed it into the safe. It worked, and he was able to peer inside the box. What he saw gave him chills.

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The Pickaxe Did The Trick

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The Safe Contained Money And Jewels
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
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Matthew Emanuel could hardly believe what he was seeing. Inside the safe were stacks of hundred dollar bills, each bundle at least three inches thick. There were also zipped plastic bags containing hundreds of valuables: chunks of gold, jade, earrings, jewels, and diamond rings were among the findings.

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They had literally stumbled upon a real-life treasure in Matthew's own backyard, right there among the fallen trees and destroyed garden. But there was one small issue.

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Money And Jewels Inside

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The Money Had Server Water Damage
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Even though he finally figured out the true purpose of the old rusted box in his backyard, there was a problem. The safe was not waterproof and many of the bills were severely damaged from years of neglect and exposure to the New York elements.

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The cash was squished together from bad water damage, and Matthew realized that he had to work quickly if he had any chance of saving some of the money.

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Trying To Salvage The Money

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Matthew Tried To Save What He Could Of The Money
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Matthew set to work trying to salvage what he could of the water damaged money, pulling bills apart and setting them aside to dry. The project was tedious and took several days. As he soon discovered, he wasn't able to save a large chunk of the treasure.

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The bills were falling apart and were too ruined to be counted as legal currency. Even excluding the ruined billed, Matthew never expected the sum of the dried bills.

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$16,300 In Cash

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The Cash Equaled $16,300
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Jonathan Cutrer/Flickr
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After everything was said and done, there was roughly $5,000 worth of bills that Matthew was unable to save. But then there was the rest of it. Albeit slightly faded, the newly dried cash came out to be $16,300. That's not even counting what the jewels are worth!

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Now that Matthew salvaged what he could from the safe, the mystery was over. Right? Nope! There was more that he had yet to learn about the mysterious safe.

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That Safe Wasn't There Randomly

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The Safe Couldn't Have Been A Coincidence
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Even though it was exciting for Matthew and his family to find a real-life treasure, he was suspicious about how the safe came to be in the backyard. He felt as though it couldn't be someone's personal belongings that they put into a non-weather proof safe and forgot about either.

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Although many people wouldn't care about the safe's origin, simply pocketing the findings and moving on, Matthew wasn't finished. He believed there was something potentially illegal going on.

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Weighing The Jewels

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He Took Inventory Of The Other Riches
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Now that the money was dried, Matthew's next task was to take inventory of the rest of the riches. The amount of gold that was inside the safe was incredible and Matthew had to take out his kitchen scale just to make note of it all.

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While he was in the middle of calculating and logging the rest of the safe's contents, Matthew stumbled across something in one of the plastic bags that would change everything.

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Matthew Found A Clue

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He Found An Adress
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ABDULLAH HAMMAM/AFP/Getty Images
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Putting the jewels aside, Matthew opened the bag to find a folded up piece of paper. It contained an address! Naturally, Matthew grabbed his phone to see where the address was located. Was it nearby?

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The address could be for any number of locations but Matthew was hopeful that it led to the owner of the safe's contents. After all, the address wouldn't lead to the actual criminal, that'd be ridiculous! What he found during his GPS search left him shocked.

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He Knew Where That Address Was

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The Address On The Paper Was Close By
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As it turned out, the address listed on the paper was very close by, enough so that Matthew wouldn't even have to take his car. The owner of the old rusted safe's contents wasn't only on Staten Island but happened to be residing in the same neighborhood.

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It dawned on Matthew that he had passed the house before, every time he walked his dog, as a matter of fact. It was then that Matthew knew what he had to do.

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He Wanted To Find The Owner Of All That Stuff

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Matthew Was A Man On A Mission
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Matthew Emanuel couldn't keep the contents of the safe to himself, not after he found the address. It wasn't his property, after all. So on April 30, 2018, two days after opening the safe and discovering its contents, Matthew walked over to the address he found scrawled on the piece of paper.

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He had no idea who was going to answer the door, or if they were even the true owners of the safe's contents. Worst case scenario, if this meeting went downhill, he could get the police involved. So he knocked.

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The Person Who Opened The Door

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An Elderly Woman Opened the Door
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
Matthew Emanuel/Twitter
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Matthew had no way of knowing who was going to open the door or what was going to happen during the very strange conversation revolving around a potential crime. Even so, he didn't expect an elderly woman to open the door.

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Not wanting to be rude, Matthew introduced himself and got right to it. He even went as far as to ask the already hesitant older woman a question, "Have you ever been robbed before?" She immediately started shaking, a reaction Matthew was not prepared for.

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They Were Victims Of A Robbery

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She And Her Husband Had Been Robbed Of $52,000
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Matthew wasn't sure if the woman was shaking due to excitement or pure terror. As it turns out, she confirmed Matthew suspicious; she had had indeed been robbed before. He couldn't believe the story she was telling him about what happened years prior.

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The night after Christmas 2011, a burglar broke into her home. By the time she and her husband had woken up, the criminal was long gone. The person had vanished along with $52,000 worth of money and jewelry.

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The Robber Was Active For Ten Years

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The Ninja Burglar Prowled The Streets For Ten Years
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Although Todt Hill is considered to be an affluent part of Staten Island, it has a frightening past. At the time of the elderly woman's 2011 robbery, there was a masked person prowling the streets of the town. The press called him the "Ninja Burglar" because of his stealth and surprising success rate.

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From 2005 to 2015, the Ninja Burglar robbed over 200 homes across Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey. 160 of those robberies being in Staten Island, many of which were in Todt Hill. Could this be his doing?

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Now He's In Prison

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Robert Costanzo
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In 2015, the authorities arrested a man named Robert Costanzo in Staten Island. He had a criminal past and was in court for something unrelated to the burglaries when he was finally charged with the break-ins. It took two years, but Costanzo finally received a sentence of 22 years in prison.

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Although many people could sleep easier knowing he was behind bars, the elderly lady Matthew found had long lost hope. Police told her that she was most likely never going to see her belongings again.

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Returning To The House

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Matthew Took the Elderly Lady To His House
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Now that he knew this old lady had been robbed a few years back, Matthew had no choice but to bring her to his home. He wanted to see if she'd be able to identify any of the jewelry. He was truly amazed by how fast everything was falling into place.

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It's unfortunate that the safe had been sitting in his backyard for all those years. Now he was so close to unraveling the mystery, and only after two days.

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A Whole Lot Of Emotions

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The Woman Was Filled With Emotions
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Jessie Jacobson/Flickr
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The moment the elderly lady saw the jewelry and stacks of cash on the counter she was overcome with emotion. She instantly started to cry and shake, all while hugging Matthew. Now they both knew the truth.

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For six and a half years she had lived with the trauma of having some stranger in her home while she slept, losing her valuables, and being told over and over that she would never see them again.

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Returning The Contents Of The Safe

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Matthew Returns Everything To Its Rightful Owner
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Matthew Emanuel returned all of the safe's contents to its rightful owner. What started off as an old rusted box, covered in poison ivy and foliage, and pretty much forgotten, had suddenly turned in to a momentous occasion in a mere few days.

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With the help of a bad winter, hungry deer, and a curious landscaper called Bamboo Bob, Matthew was able to help a lady reclaim some of the lost valuables that were wrongfully taken from her, solving something that the police were unable to for more than six years.

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Matthew Was Just Doing The Right Thing

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In his mind, there was no question of what he was going to do with the safe's contents. Every piece of jewelry and each of the dollars he carefully separated and dried out were going to their true owner, his elderly neighbor. He also refused any type of award for returning the stolen items.

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He told the press that they only reward he could hope for was good karma. After all, he was just doing the right thing! But he did make sure to do something so he never forgot the event.

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Where The Safe Once Stood

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An Elephant Statue To Replace The Mysterious Safe
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CBS New York/Youtube
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Bamboo Bob had finished the backyard and the safe was back with its true owner. He and his family decided to commemorate the entire experience by placing a tiny ceramic elephant in the backyard by the bamboo.

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They wanted to mark the spot of the safe, the memory of the mysterious box that was part of their yard for four years. And as a reminder that real-life mysteries can be solved and that treasure could be sitting right under your nose.

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Internet Post About A Secret Room Goes Viral, Homeowner Didn't Expect This

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After moving into his first house in 2015, an Imgur user named Jerry shared his weird story of cleaning out the previous owner's things. The old man had passed away, and the house was sold as-is, meaning it was in desperate need of some cleaning and a makeover.

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As a first time homeowner, Jerry was okay with the house needing a little work. Little did he know exactly what he was getting himself into or what secrets he was about to discover.

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Working On The Basement

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After two weeks of moving his things into the house and starting some much-needed renovations, Jerry set his sights on the unfinished basement. In his post, he claimed that the basement was full of junk that needed to be tossed to make room for his belongings.

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Since the previous owner didn't have any family close enough to come over and remove the items, it was up to Jerry to remove them himself — and there was a lot of stuff!

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There Was No Secret Room Mentioned In The Listing

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While cleaning out the basement, Jerry noticed a large piece of plywood leaning up against the cinder block wall. Definitely out of place, he pried it off. Apparently the wood was hiding another room because Jerry discovered a gigantic hole in the wall where more cinder blocks should be.

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As a new homeowner, finding a secret room that the real estate agent was unaware of was cause for a little bit of concern. What was inside?

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The Room Was Full Of Crates And Boxes

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The four-by-four room was full of boxes, crates, and tiny pouches littered across the floor. The room wasn't connected to the house’s electrical circuit, so Jerry had to run and grab a flashlight to see what was inside the creates.

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The place almost seemed like a bunker of sorts, but that didn’t make sense. Why wasn’t it cleaned out? It looked as though no one had been there in ages. Is it possible that the previous owner was hiding something?

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A Secret Safe

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"At this point, I am a little shocked, and a little scared," Jerry wrote. Curiosity got the better of him and he climbed through the small hole. The first thing he noticed in the tiny room were the gun casings stacked on top of one another. They were empty but plentiful. Why hoard empty casings?

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That's when he noticed something in the corner of the room. A Sentry safe, heavy and completely locked.

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Should The Safe Be Opened?

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Jerry wasn't sure what to do. Should he call the previous owner’s children to see if they know anything about the safe or the secret room? What if they wanted some of the items that were stored away?

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He decided he was going to try and open the safe. Although it’s a bit unethical, the safe is technically his since he bought the house as-is. The only issue being, what if he finds something bad?

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Other Interesting Finds

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He put opening the safe on the back burner, deciding to investigate the contents in the room a bit further. That's when he found hundreds of live rounds of ammunition. The scary part? They were all in unlocked cases and obviously stored here by the previous owner.

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Jerry couldn’t tell if it was a collection or if they were hidden away in the basement for some alternative reason. Unfortunately, he was about to find out.

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Returning To The Secret Room

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After further exploration, Jerry found more army-style bins that held similar items like the ammo. He called it a night, deciding that he would come back to the secret room in the morning. It was a lot to wrap his head around.

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He would be in the right mood to tear apart the room after a good night's sleep.He wondered what types of secrets and treasures were in the basement. What on Earth did he stumble across down there?

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Lots Of Military Equipment

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The next day brought new revelations to Jerry. He climbed back into the room to investigate the numerous boxes and crates scattered around, only to realize that most of them were labeled as military-grade.

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Why would an old man have all of this military equipment? Jerry knew right then that he had to open the containers to see what lied inside. The thing is, he was not prepared for what he found.

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Civilian Marksmanship Program

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He found an empty rifle case that was marked "Civilian Marksmanship Program," meaning the previous homeowner knew how to use these guns. Something wasn't right, the previous owner wasn’t just collecting the guns and ammo, he was using them.

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Maybe he had special military permission to have the items in his house? That didn’t seem right either, so Jerry decided to open the crates. The contents almost had him running out of the room…

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A Bunch Of Ammo

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Things got a lot more serious after Jerry opened the crates. Hidden in the room was an SKS air rifle, crates of blank ammo, two crates of rifle ammo, a box of 19mm military-grade ammo, a box of 8mm ammo, boxes of Wolf 39mm ammo, and a dead grenade.

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That's a lot of ammo for an old man. Why was it hidden away? The weirdest part is that Jerry’s strangest discovery is the most harmless.

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Who Needs That Many Pennies?

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In one of the crates, he stashed a boat-load of pennies! So what was the connection between all of the military equipment and the pennies? They must be worth something, why else would he store such a large quantity?

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They were worth hiding for some reason, Jerry just couldn't figure out why. His concern started growing as he tried to figure out why the previous owner was hiding all of these things in the basement.

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Saving For A Rainy Day

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Maybe they were doomsday "preppers." People who like to be super prepared for the inevitable collapse of society because of war, a natural disaster, or the zombie apocalypse. They usually stockpile ammo and guns. But wouldn't there be canned goods and water, too?

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Also, some collectors like to save pennies from pre-1980s because they were made out of copper. Something that could be used for trade, in case the dollar loses its value in the world.

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Coming Back To The Safe

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Now, back to the creepy, heavy-duty safe in the corner. Jerry couldn't move it due to the weight, so he was going to have to figure out how to open it in the room. Cracking the code was out of the question, so he gathered his father’s tools to try and pry it open.

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After spending way more time trying to pry the safe open than he would like to admit, Jerry finally called a locksmith.

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What Could Be Inside?

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Jerry took to his Imgur thread that was now gaining an audience following, telling everyone that the locksmith was going to come by the up-coming Monday and to stay tuned for an update. Seemed as though everyone was excited to see what was inside!

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If the old man thought it was fine to leave military-grade guns and ammunition out in the open, what could he possibly have that warranted him locking it away?

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Not A Peep

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That was the last time the Imgur thread heard from Jerry. After the radio silence, the internet world began to hypothesize what happened to him. Some say he got the safe open, found a ton of cash, ditched the thread, and ran. Others say the viral story gave him some unwanted attention and that Jerry posted something he shouldn't have

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Little did the spectators know that the latter is relatively close to the truth.

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A New Update

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After two years, Jerry took to the thread again, his subject heading reading, "UPDATE: If anyone remembers or cares." He dives into the scary story of what his life had been like for the past couple of years.

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Crazy things began to happen to him after the posts went viral, forcing him to go into hiding for years before feeling comfortable enough to go back online to finish his tale of the secret room.

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Strange Happenings

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First, two days after posting the story, strange-looking people rang the doorbell. Having no idea who they were or what they wanted, he didn't answer the door. They stuck around for a few minutes before getting in their car and leaving.

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The next night, something startled him awake, and his dog began to growl. That’s when something either hit his house or someone knocked on a door or window. Who does that in the middle of the night?

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The Threat Of A Break In

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Two nights later, someone broke into Jerry's neighbor’s house. Nothing was stolen, but it was very clear that the intruders were looking for something specific. It may have been pure coincidence, but Jerry is fairly sure the people who broke in next door thought they were breaking into his house.

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What if they were tech-savvy enough to track where the posts were coming from? Thankfully, no one had been hurt, but Jerry was beyond paranoid.

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Now We Know Why He Moved Away

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Jerry told his followers that he would not reveal what he found in the safe, saying that he's too paranoid about posting it online after everything that happened to him.

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He has since moved out of the house, not wanting the new owners to go through what he did. The world may never know what the old man was actually preparing for, and the ending of this freaky tale leaves us with more questions than answers.