A bone rush may be underway in New York City’s East River after a woolly mammoth expert revealed the site where 500,000 tusks were reportedly dumped.
On the Joe Rogan podcast, bone mogul-turned-gold miner John Reeves said he wanted to incite a “bone rush” and mapped the location of 50 tons of mammoth tusks that may be at the bottom of the East River.
Reeves read from a draft report from the Fairbanks Mining District of Alaska that described the 1940 shipment of 500,000 tusks from Fairbanks to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.
Reeves, who owns thousands of acres of mining land in the area and got his hands on the report and spoke to its lead author Richard Osborne of the University of Alaska, said the museum was “out of storage” and had disposed of the bones.
The report revealed the location of the landfill on East River Drive and 65th Street.
Woolly mammoth tusks can cost around $20,000 depending on condition, putting the potential value at the bottom of the river at around $1 billion.
“If any of you guys want to go out there and find some bones, I’ll tell you exactly where the hell they are,” Reeves said while spelling out the location. “They are finders and guardians.”
Some boners, the term for people looking for valuable bones, have already taken up the call and shared videos of their trips to the East River.
John Reeves, an Alaskan gold miner turned mammoth expert, has revealed the location of 500,000 tusk bones said to have been dumped in the middle of New York’s East River
Reeves said the tusks were “accidentally” dumped along East River Drive near 65th Street
Citing the draft report, Reeves said gold miners shipped 500,000 tusks to New York because the owners saw “no value.”
“You have to remember that this was 1928 to 1958,” Reeves told Rogan. “Guys, you know miners didn’t collect the bones.”
According to the tusk report, “mistakes” were made regarding the “acceptable condition” of the bones shipped to New York.
“They took about a carload of these bones, they ran out of storage, and they dumped them in the East River,” Reeves said.
The tusks were eventually dumped into the river at the former New York City Hospital garbage dump.
The revelation has sparked a bone rush, with fortune seekers already hitting the river in search of the tusks, which could fetch $20,000 apiece
In all, the tusks, which were reportedly disposed of in the 1940s, are worth up to $1 billion
Though Reeves said the exact method and location of the dump was unknown, he noted that the mammoth’s tusks were dense and would not swim away, suggesting they could still be somewhere at the bottom of the river.
Reeves mused, “If I was listening to your podcast and I happened to have a boat and I happened to have a little scuba gear?”
Rogan was also excited at the prospect of the successful Bone Rush that Reeves proposed.
“You know how crazy it would be if there were fucking mammoth bones in the East River,” Rogan said.
“Dude, let me tell you about mammoth bones and mammoth tusks, they’re extremely valuable,” Reeves replied.
Alaskan miners, seeing no value in the tusks, reportedly shipped them to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Pictured: tusks found during an Alaskan expedition in 1907
Reeves (right) said he wanted to induce a bone rush. The gold digger has found thousands of preserved bones on his land
Since finding mammoth bones decades ago, Reeves has built a collection called Boneyard Alaska that houses his rare specimens
Pictured: tusks of a woolly mammoth found on Reeves’ land
Reeves, a self-made millionaire, knows the value of tusks after discovering perfectly preserved mammoth bones while prospecting for gold in Alaska.
Reeves, owner of Fairbanks Gold, LLC, owns thousands of acres of mining properties along rivers in the state.
In an interview with academic researchers, Reeves described himself as an excellent swimmer who went to college in Florida before deciding to join prospectors in Alaska.
In the 1980s, Reeves bought a gold dredging site outside of Fairbanks, which was converted into a tourist spot where visitors could pan for gold along the river. The site has since been sold to Holland America.
Reeves continued to increase its share of mining claims in Fairbanks, also buying up state and federal lands.
In a 2012 National Geographic documentary about Ice Age fossil collectors in Alaska, Reeves boasted of finding thousands of specimens on his land.
While his fellow miners joked that prospecting for gold was more lucrative, Reeves said he became an avid collector of the ancient bones.
“Mammoth tusks are funnier to look at,” he had said. “I like them more than the stacks of $100 bills.”