The Lost Adams Diggings are the subject of a Southwestern treasure story, dating to the early 1860s, that refers to the existence of a canyon rich in gold deposits somewhere in western New Mexico.

[3] After Apaches set his wagon on fire, Adams drove a dozen saved horses towards Sacaton, Arizona, with the hope to sell them.

In Sacaton, Adams met a group of twenty-one miners led by John Brewer traveling together in search of the gold fields.

And those tears are larger than your coins!” Supposedly, In 1862, the young Pima-Mexican had gone on an expedition with the Apaches during which they attacked Pueblo Indians in western New Mexico.

[5] Within a few days the group collected a fortune of gold nuggets that they hid in a corn-grinding basin left by ancient Indians.

The party decided to send Brewer and five others to buy more supplies at Old Fort Wingate, west of modern Grants.

[9] Upon recovery Adams settled in California and when the Apache Wars ended, he led several expeditions to find the canyon and the basin filled with gold.

But, it was not until 1918, that he claimed to have single-handedly found the skeletons and Adam's cabin at the mouth of a canyon 35 miles (56.3 km) northwest of Magdalena, New Mexico.

Thousands of prospectors, ranch-hands, and men-of-fortune searched this area and the rest of southwestern New Mexico prior to World War II, as the Adams diggings became the most sought-for gold in the country.

The combination of the Great Depression and the deregulation of the gold market prompted the most unlikely people to search for the diggings.

Dozens of mining camps in this region of New Mexico were thought to be the Adams diggings for brief periods, until each proved itself to be less rich than at first indicated: egregious hopes followed by rapid disappointment.

The new book demonstrates the presence of significant gold mineralization, adds a wrinkle to the story by presenting evidence of colonial Spanish activity in the area dated to the 1600s, and identifies and locates every critical landmark.

The new book contains maps, pictures of artifacts, assay reports, and is written in a conversational format with Dick interviewing the re-discoverers Paul Hale and Ronald Schade.

In some minds the gold was to be found on either the Zuni or Navajo reservations, but the laws preventing the acquisition of mineral rights in these regions have discouraged searching.

If it really exists, its traditional location remains within "Apacheria" or the southwest quadrant of New Mexico and bordering areas in Arizona.

The complexity of the story is detailed in Jack Purcell's definitive book on the subject, The Lost Adams Diggings: Myth, Mystery, and Madness.

Perhaps gold will be found someday, but in the minds of most, the legend is fading away among the other items in the forgotten annals of American lore.

Its legend has supplied many folk tales, stories and books with ample fuel for fantasies of lost treasures, hidden canyons, Apache secrets and gold "somewhere out there" in the wilds.