Post by Deleted on Apr 13, 2019 14:07:52 GMT -5
Some Background
Notwithstanding all of the confusion following the posting of Scrapbook #62 on Dal Neitzel’s website in April 2014, the strategies required to decode The Thrill of the Chase appear to very closely resemble those seen in British-style, or cryptic crossword puzzles.
In the United States, these puzzles were initially popularized by Frank Lewis, who published them in The Nation starting in the late 1940s. Subsequently, Stephen Sondheim published them in New York Magazine between 1968 and 1969, and they reached a wider audience between 1997 and 2009 when Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon published the Atlantic Puzzler in the Atlantic Monthly and continued to publish similar puzzles in the Wall Street Journal.
If you are not familiar with this clue style, I would strongly recommend that you look over this Wikipedia summary:
Pay particular attention to the sections on anagrams, deletions, and initialism.
As I suggested earlier, I think that compiling letters from the beginnings and ends of words is one of the key approaches to deciphering the clues.
There are several hints to proceed this way:
The most obvious is that collecting the first and last letters of the first and last lines of the poems yields “IDEA.”
Secondly, we have:
THE END IS EVER >>> THE END I SEVER
At a somewhat more subtle level we have the following three hints.
______________________________________
If you go back to the preface of the book, you will read about Forrest's dear friend, Eric Sloane. His real name was Everard Hinrichs.
AS I HAVE GONE ALONE IN THERE
I CAN KEEP MY SECRET WHERE
AND HINT OF RICHES NEW AND OLD
THE END IS EVER DRAWING NIGH
_____________________________________
The Thrill Of the Chase
TTOTC reversed is CTOTT.
C >>> See
TO >>> Two
TT >>> Pi
At the end we may be looking for a circle.
_____________________________________
Put in below the home of Brown
Pb is the chemical symbol for lead.
(Remember Forrest's allusion to the lead searcher?)
_____________________________________
Which brings us to the first clue.
We have been instructed to “Begin it where warm waters halt.” As many others have suggested, I think we are probably looking for a hot spring.
The answer I get requires combining information from line 3 with line 21 of the poem. (3 and 21 go nicely together, don’t they?).
Line 3 reads:
I CAN KEEP MY SECRET WHERE.
Get out your cleaver and glue (not for the last time) to get
I CAN KEEP MY SECRET W HERE.
Save that W for now.
Line 21 reads:
SO HEAR ME ALL AND LISTEN GOOD
LISTEN GOOD anagrams to ITS GLEN OOD.
Now insert your W to get
IT’S GLENWOOD.
The “now” just above these letters lets you know (NO W) that you are indeed missing a W.
Confirmers
Glenwood Springs is indeed the site of the world’s largest hot springs pool.
It is also 88 miles by car from Leadville, Colorado. Molly Brown lived in Leadville with her new husband between 1886 and 1894. The capital letters PB provide us with a hint for Lead, and the distance to Glenwood Springs, is arguably not too far, but too far to walk.
Glenwood Springs is at 5,761 feet, which fits thus far with the specification that the treasure be above 5,000 but below 10,200 feet. Remarkably, to the nearest 100 feet, Leadville is at precisely 10,200. This would nicely explain the somewhat odd selection of 10,200 as an altitude limit.
Finally, Glenwood Canyon is just east of Glenwood Springs.
The first clue is GLENWOOD SPRINGS.
