A trio of friends spent a frantic Wednesday night hunting through a Como Park woods for the 52nd annual Pioneer Press Treasure Hunt medallion.
The 12th and final clue of the hunt, held in conjunction with the St. Paul Winter Carnival, was just published in the newspaper and the park was full of people.
"It was shoulder to shoulder," said Michael Corrigan, one of the three who claimed the full $10,000 prize. Josh Stender and Craig Black were his partners in the hunt.
The ground had a light snow on it, but the leaves and area had been kicked up and it was dark, so it was very difficult to tell exactly where they were, they said, but they knew they were in the right area because the final clue gave detailed directions.
"I dove to the ground, and there it was in a block of ice," Corrigan said Thursday. The prize included $2,500 for finding the medallion, $2,500 for clipping all the clues and $5,000 for having a registered Winter Carnival button. The prize also included $1,200 in food from Cub Foods and a trip for two to Hawaii from MLT Worry Free Vacations.
The three will divide the money and groceries and figure out later how to deal with the trip for two.
The find was the culmination of 10 years of treasure hunting for Corrigan, 24, of St. Paul. He said he is a trivia and puzzle fan.
Fellow students at Cretin-Derham Hall got him interested in the Treasure Hunt. Five years later, he was still looking and enlisted the help of his University of Minnesota roommate Josh Stender, now 24, of Minneapolis. Stender said he took to the task of looking through clues and was prepared to tromp through the usual snow.
In a bit of irony, when the two lived in St. Paul on Cleveland Avenue, "the medallion was hidden about 500 feet from our back yard," Corrigan said. "That was kind of a tease."
This year, Craig Black, 24, of Apple Valley, joined in their activities. He claims he is now a "three-day veteran" of the annual Treasure Hunt. He and Stender are friends from Rosemount High School. Both are accountants for different firms, and Corrigan said he is "bouncing around jobs" right now and is doing data entry as an office temp.
To find the medallion, Stender and Black were at Como Park (directed there by a clue that mentioned "who," which took them to Horton Avenue, as in "Horton Hears a Who.") Corrigan lined up in front of the Pioneer Press about 7 p.m. Wednesday to wait with hundreds of other hunters for the last clue to come out.
"I was fifth in line. I was on my cell phone when I got the clue, called Josh and Craig, and headed to the park. I went to where they were looking, and it was just luck that I found it," Corrigan said.
The treasurer hunters said that before Wednesday, they were looking at Harriet Island like everybody else, but switched to Como from a clue that mentioned a zoo.
"The clues were hard this year," Corrigan said.
As for finding the treasure, he said it was fun to be part of the tradition of the carnival and that he will be back next year, maybe not as frantic as before when the goal was to find the medallion.
"The hunt itself is fun," he said.
Black and Corrigan both said they will use their money to buy cars, Black noting that he still drives his "high school-college" car.
Stender said he will use his to subscribe to the Pioneer Press.
Copyright 2003 Pioneer Press.
