![\"George](\"https:\/\/scpr.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/0a024ba\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/6000x4799+0+0\/resize\/792x633!\/quality\/90\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fscpr-brightspot.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com%2Ffa%2F54%2Fe4f98b164017af0b754227a1b4a5%2Fdefault.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Mining engineer George Warren Shufelt with his radio X-ray device in Los Angeles., circa 1934.<\/p>\n
(<\/p>\n
Courtesy UCLA Library Digital Collections\/Los Angeles Times Photographic Collection<\/p>\n
)<\/p>\n
The land was L.A. County property, so they somehow convinced the Board of Supervisors to let them dig. In February<\/a> that year, they entered into a contract that exchanged digging permission for a split of the bounty: Half would go to the three of them and the other half to the government.<\/p>\n News reports breathlessly followed the developments with headlines like \u201cTreasure hunt on hill to reach climax today.\u201d<\/p>\n New ploys<\/p>\n Finding that gold was a moving target.<\/p>\n The crew dug shafts like gophers. In early March 1933<\/a>, the machine showed there was a stash 28 feet down<\/a>. But as they got closer to the end, with no gold in sight, Shufelt changed the plan.<\/p>\n Now, the search was for a tunnel leading to a long lost treasure cave on the map, roughly 9 feet down<\/a> a different shaft. Changing direction didn\u2019t help \u2014 no gold was found.<\/p>\n Later that month, after an earthquake, the search was halted<\/a> as the county ordered their diggers to stay out of the shaft. But once it settled, he fought to get the contract renewed<\/a> for 30 days.<\/p>\n This time, he argued a thorough survey of the hill showed a \u201clabyrinth of tunnels<\/a>\u201d with at least 16 places where gold was buried or in vaults. But while the county approved it, the miners seemingly gave up on the dig just a few months later.<\/p>\n A last ditch effort<\/p>\n In November<\/a> of that year, Shufelt came back with yet another elaborate tale.<\/p>\n He said Little Chief Green Leaf, a Native medicine man in Arizona, told him about a legend of buried gold under the Hall of Justice and the Central Library, which was left 5,000 years ago by a tribe of humans called the Lizard People<\/a>, a more technologically advanced<\/a> community than modern society.<\/p>\n It was supposed to be laid out to resemble a lizard, the community\u2019s symbol of long life. The tail should\u2019ve been below Fifth and Hope streets, with the city\u2019s \u201ckey room\u201d under South Broadway and Second Street. Gold tablets inside there were supposed to have the origins of the human race.<\/p>\n Shufelt said his gold-finding machine had taken X-ray pictures of these tablets, but he told the L.A. Times<\/a> \u201cthe legendary story must remain speculative until unearthed by excavation.\u201d This time, they wanted to dig 1,000 feet down.<\/p>\n