Guest Submission by Solo Amerigo: When Rabbit Holes Work: The Arcturus Project and the Value of Disciplined Speculation

When Rabbit Holes Work: The Arcturus Project and the Value of Disciplined Speculation

By Solo Amerigo
June 7, 2026

Chicago, Illinois. May 27, 1933. 9:15 p.m.

The lights of the Chicago World’s Fair suddenly sprang to life. The crowd let out a collective gasp of amazement. Light harvested from the star Arcturus had turned on the lights that fateful Chicago night at exactly 9:15 p.m. on May 27, 1933, to open the Century of Progress World’s Fair. The idea sprang from the brain of Edwin Brandt Frost, the second director of Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin. To Frost, the symbolism was irresistible. The harvested light had begun its journey from Arcturus forty years earlier, around the time Chicago celebrated its first World’s Fair, the 1893 Columbian Exposition. What appeared to be a simple lighting ceremony became a demonstration of astronomy, engineering, imagination, and human ingenuity, all working in harmony.

From a Lions Share perspective, Edwin Frost was an interesting character. In the first article of this series here, the Yerkes Observatory transformed from a failed solve into a workable instrument that made the observatory a shortcut pointing to the real solve instead of being the solve itself. The Yerkes solve was built on clues harvested from all 23 chapters of There’s Treasure Inside, and Edwin Frost was the glue holding it all together by way of Chapter Four where the Robert Frost quote opened the chapter with “the road not taken.” Robert Frost. Edwin Frost. Not only did the names match, but the spirit of the quote matched Edwin Frost’s life.

By the time of the 1933 World’s Fair, Frost had spent years directing Yerkes Observatory despite having lost his eyesight. Many people would have viewed his blindness as the end of an astronomical career. Frost did not. Instead, he adapted, persevered, and concluded his career by orchestrating one of the most memorable public demonstrations in American astronomical history, the lighting of the World’s Fair using light from the star Arcturus.

Sometimes what appears to be the end of a path is actually the beginning of a different one. That is Edwin Frost’s story in a nutshell. That is also the lesson of the failed Yerkes Observatory solve where the destination had failed but the clues did not fail. I found the story of Edwin Frost’s successful lighting experiment through researching the connection Yerkes Observatory had with Mt. Wilson Observatory from page 164 of the book. In the solve, Mt. Wilson was not the star of the show, Yerkes was, and Yerkes failed as a solve. Does that make the Yerkes Observatory a rabbit hole? How much imagination is okay for treasure hunters to use when studying clues? When Jon Collins-Black invited readers to do more research when their “spidey sense tingles”, how many orders of magnitude can you go into the weeds before your clue has gone too far?

Recently, Low Rents, at lowrentsresearch tackled rabbit holes in a twelve-article series The Architecture of Confidence wherein he demonstrates how treasure hunts happen in two phases, the clue interpretation phase and the boots-on-the-ground (BOTG) phase. The journey the treasure hunter experiences in these two phases goes off the rails when imagination, which is necessary during phase one, goes wild. The series argues that treasure hunts require imagination, speculation, and a willingness to follow unusual ideas into unfamiliar territory. Undisciplined imagination, however, results in “overfit“ defined loosely as trying to stuff a clue into a predetermined shape. Low Rents argues the only way to identify an overfit is by going boots-on-the-ground and discovering the treasure is not there.

It begs the question. Does unmasking a rabbit hole require a physical field search? It seems that, ideally, a rabbit hole should be unmasked while you are still at home. But how do we judge between a potential solve and a misleading rabbit hole? What we need is a way to test rabbit holes before going out in the field. Joy’s Serenade also leans toward that idea:

“Use will’s straight edge, as the turning square or any arc may align at a proper point.”

Somehow, we need a way to test clues while we are still in the research stage at home. After searching Yerkes and failing to find the treasure, I decided to try an experiment. In the first paper, I used the straight-edge-turning-square-arc clue by successfully turning the Yerkes Observatory into a compass. Then we mapped the compass out to 100 miles and 1,000 miles using Yerkes as the origin point. By the end of the first paper, I had plotted five population density circles onto the map and felt quite confident Yerkes was the right origin. Then again, I had only run two tests before running out of options. At best, all I really had was a weak positive. I needed another way to test Yerkes, and in this paper decided to try using the same data but with a different navigation device, a sailor’s sextant. If the two navigation instruments produce the same model that reduces the search field, then, I reasoned, Yerkes would stand stronger as a waypoint and not a rabbit hole.

In the past, sailors used sextants to figure out if they were still on course. A sextant measures the angle between a celestial object and the horizon and narrows the possibilities of where the ship is located. Multiple observations narrow it further. The process is one of reduction rather than revelation. In this paper I will attempt the same experiment that I did in the first paper, but will use a sextant.  I will use the Yerkes Observatory coordinates, the star Arcturus, and I will use the only date in the entire book that has a time stamp, 10 a.m., from the opening sentence of Chapter 11, which reads, Montevideo, Uruguay July 2, 1752, 10 a.m. The origin will not be Montevideo, it will be Yerkes Observatory.

Test Number 1. For the sextant reading, I used 10 a.m., plus the coordinates of Yerkes Observatory, plus the star Arcturus (because of Edwin Frost). The test returned an unexpected result. At the Yerkes location, on that date at that time, Arcturus was below the horizon. A navigator standing at Yerkes could not have physically seen the star to use a sextant at that moment. The test failed. At least, it failed as a practical celestial observation. I tried again. In today’s computer world, it is possible to calculate where the star would have been in the sky even if it was below the horizon. The math returned a northeast bearing right where one of the density circles sits, but fair is fair. If the star is below the horizon, sextant-wise, it should be out of play, even if we can force a solve. Test one: fail.

For test two, I tried using the date and time of the opening-night ceremony of Chicago’s Century of Progress World’s Fair. I googled the date and the exact time when the lights came on and then repeated the sextant calculation using the same Yerkes coordinates and Arcturus. This time Arcturus was visible above the horizon, high in the southeastern sky.

For a brief moment, it felt as though the model might be onto something until I considered the evidence. If test one failed because Arcturus was below the horizon, was test two any more reliable? Yes, Arcturus was above the horizon, but I had to google the date and the time, and I was using both Yerkes and Arcturus which are not mentioned in the book. So, even though Arcturus was above the horizon and returned a bearing southwest toward a population density circle, with no actual book clues engaged, there is no other way to put it. Test Two: fail.

It was time to set navigation aside and try something else. I gathered all the dates in the book. After collecting all explicit dates from the twenty-three chapters, I curated years that appeared in more than one chapter. Most dates occurred only once except for six years that appeared multiple times across otherwise unrelated sections of the book: 1848, 1882, 1917, 1963, 1996, and 2017.

The year 1848 appeared in Chapter 12 and Chapter 18. In Chapter 12, it marked the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill, California’s transfer to the United States, and President Polk’s announcement of the Gold Rush. In Chapter 18, 1848 marked Andrew Carnegie’s migration from Scotland to Pittsburgh. Taken together, these references suggest themes of movement, opportunity, wealth creation, expansion, and transformation.

The year 1882 appeared in Chapter 14 and Chapter 22. In one chapter, Chester Arthur commissioned Tiffany to decorate the White House. In the other, Pablo Picasso was born. The connection is less geographic and more thematic, linking artistic creation, craftsmanship, and cultural influence.

The year 1917 appeared in Chapter 3 and Chapter 18. In Chapter 3, the Imperial Egg disappeared during the Russian Revolution. In Chapter 18, the Hooker 100-inch telescope was erected at Mount Wilson Observatory. One event concerns the loss of an object. The other concerns a dramatic expansion in humanity’s ability to observe and discover. This was the only repeated year in the dataset that directly intersected the astronomy framework with what was already present elsewhere in the data.

The year 1963 appeared in Chapter 8 and Chapter 10. Charles Loloma traveled to Paris and President Kennedy was assassinated. Both events represent significant cultural transitions, although the connection appears more thematic than geographic.

The year 1996 appeared in Chapters 15 and 16. Both chapters revolve around the Atlanta Olympics and the Nigerian soccer team’s historic performance. This repetition appears intentional but remains largely confined to the athletics framework.

The year 2017 appeared in Chapters 2, 19, and 22. The year marked the publication of the Arts of Asia story about the 100 rings, the discovery of a meteorite, and the beginning of Jon Collins-Black’s family life. The common theme appears to be beginnings and new phases rather than any obvious geographic relationship.

Several patterns emerged from these repeated years. First, every repeated year marked some form of transition. Migrations, discoveries, commissions, disappearances, births, breakthroughs, and beginnings appeared repeatedly throughout the dataset. Second, movement was nearly universal. People moved, objects were lost and found, discoveries occurred, institutions expanded, and opportunities emerged. Third, the repeated years frequently clustered around moments of creation and transformation. Wealth was created, artistic careers began, scientific capabilities expanded, cultural changes occurred, athletic barriers were broken, and families were formed.

Notably, the repeated years did not appear to identify locations. Instead, they identified intersections between otherwise independent clue systems. The strongest example was 1917, as already discussed. The astronomy theme, however, is present all across the book.

This suggests the value of the dates may not lie in the years themselves but in revealing which clues go together. Same dates in different chapters. Matching years in different chapters, might suggest a way to test for rabbit holes before committing to boots-on-the-ground searches.

Other Patterns in the Collected Dates Dataset

Next, I explored several additional ways the dataset might be organized. One possibility was that the dates themselves might function as celestial observations. Could I use a sextant on other dates? I tested this idea using the thirteen dates that only occur once in the book:

April 19, 1879
July 21, 1920
December 28, 1920
May 20, 1932
May 21, 1937
June 11, 1937
November 22, 1963
January 24, 1848
April 30, 1844
October 16, 1859
November 27, 1790
December 14, 1799
July 2, 1752

Using the singleton dates with the Yerkes coordinates and Arcturus would work except that I still needed a time of day. None of the singletons had a clock time, I decided to reuse 10 a.m., because it is the only time connected to a date in the entire book. The test returned six dates where Arcturus was above the horizon.

Date	Reference	Altitude	Bearing / Azimuth	Horizon
July 2, 1752	Ch. 11 — Shipwreck narrative	-19.0°	37.1°	Below
November 27, 1790	Ch. 17 — Washington in Philadelphia	67.3°	186.5°	Above
December 14, 1799	Ch. 17 — Washington dies	61.7°	221.0°	Above
April 30, 1844	Ch. 14 — Thoreau fire	-24.3°	333.8°	Below
January 24, 1848	Ch. 12 — Sutter’s Mill	34.8°	264.0°	Above
October 16, 1859	Ch. 14 — Harpers Ferry	50.1°	112.8°	Above
April 19, 1879	Ch. 5 — Mary Elizabeth Williams born	-19.7°	323.3°	Below
July 21, 1920	Ch. 5 — Cuba to New York	-10.2°	51.9°	Below
December 28, 1920	Ch. 7 — Amelia air show	53.6°	240.2°	Above
May 20, 1932	Ch. 7 — Solo Atlantic flight	-27.9°	353.7°	Below
May 21, 1937	Ch. 7 — Around-world attempt	-27.8°	354.6°	Below
June 11, 1937	Ch. 7 — Amelia disappears	-27.2°	16.5°	Below
November 22, 1963	Ch. 10 — JFK assassination	66.3°	172.9°	Above
April 8, 1973	Ch. 22 — Picasso dies	-14.5°	314.3°	Below

Next, I compared the results to the population density, great circle map from the first article and discovered:

Great Lakes circle: no results returned
Mid-Atlantic / D.C. circle: no results returned
Southeast / Gulf circle: 172.9°
Texas / South-central circle: 221.0°
West Coast circle: no results returned

Only two bearings landed on circles, and both placed Arcturus above the horizon:

·       November 22, 1963, chapter 10, JFK assassination, bearing 172.9 degrees, above horizon, Texas/South Central population density circle

·       December 14, 1799, Chapter 17, Washington dies, bearing 221.0 degrees, above horizon, Southeast population density circle.

This was a viable test. Moreover, JFK died in the Texas circle. The sextant test matched the chapter content. Coincidence? Same for Washington. He died in the Southeast circle. The great circle, population density map reduced from five circles to two circles. Geographic reduction is what we are looking for, but the rabbit hole problem was not completely gone. I still had to rely on 10 a.m. which is not from the dates’ chapters, and we still have Yerkes Observatory as a derivative of Mt. Wilson. Whether these matches represent meaningful signal or coincidence remains unclear, but they were sufficient to justify further examination of the date dataset.

Other dataset patterns proved equally interesting. A noticeable concentration of nineteenth-century references repeatedly cluster around the period between the 1840s and the 1890s, including 1844, 1848, 1851, 1859, 1860, 1879, 1880, 1882, 1889, 1892, and 1896. Whether or not the cluster was intentional, it is hard to dismiss the nineteenth century center of gravity in the dataset.

The dataset also produced an unexpected astronomy result. Before collecting the data, I expected astronomy to dominate the framework. Instead, only one repeated year, 1917, directly intersected astronomy through the Hooker Telescope at Mount Wilson Observatory. Most repeated year dates were associated with history, exploration, art, politics, migration, entrepreneurship, and cultural change rather than celestial observation.

Another surprise was the emergence of 1848 as perhaps the strongest repeated year in the dataset. Gold was discovered. California changed hands. Carnegie emigrated from Scotland to Pittsburgh. Wealth, opportunity, migration, expansion, and transformation all converged within the same year. Unlike 1917, where the repeated references clustered around a single observational framework centered on astronomy and discovery, 1848 produced a dense network of connections across multiple unrelated domains.

At this point, a second reduction framework popped into view. The first paper identified a pattern of geographic reduction where broad areas narrowed into progressively smaller ones: Continent → Country → Region → State → Locality

Here in this paper, we have the same thing with time:  Era → Century → Decade → Year → Date → Time

Finally, July 2, 1752, at 10:00 a.m., remains the most precise timestamp in the entire dataset. Unlike every other date collected, it contains a year, month, day, and time, however, both sextant tests failed to move Yerkes Observatory entirely out of the rabbit hole category.

Taken together, these observations suggest that the dates may not function as destinations. Instead, they appear to function as organizing mechanisms. Their greatest value lies not in where they point, but in what they connect. By identifying clusters, intersections, and patterns of reduction, the date framework yields another method for evaluating speculative rabbit holes before committing to a boots-on-the-ground search. A location supported by multiple independent frameworks deserves further attention. A location supported by only one or two becomes much easier to set aside.

Conclusion

When I began this paper, I thought I was testing whether Yerkes Observatory could function as a sextant. Here at the conclusion, I realize I was actually testing something much larger. I was testing a rabbit hole. The Arcturus Project did not produce the result I expected. The tests generated bearings and interesting observations and even a few geographic coincidences worth noting, yet the evidence never became strong enough to justify treating the sextant model as a reliable method of reduction. By that standard, the experiment failed.

That failure, however, turned out to be surprisingly productive. The dataset revealed patterns I was not looking for when I started. Repeated years emerged. Intersections emerged. A second form of reduction emerged. The investigation gradually shifted away from Arcturus and toward something more useful. In other words, the rabbit hole produced information even though it failed to produce a solution thereby changing the way I have been thinking about treasure hunting for the past year.

Many searchers treat a failed solve as a dead end. Once the treasure is not there, the instinct is to throw everything away and start over. I now think that approach discards some of the most valuable information available. A failed solve is not necessarily evidence that the work was wrong. It could simply be that the work was incomplete. In this case, the Arcturus experiments suggest the clues in the book might be pointing toward a process rather than a destination, at least during the early to middle stages of research.

Take the Yerkes Observatory in the first paper. The destination failed, but the clues survived and produced a working instrument onto which we mapped the population density circles. That led to the Arcturus Project in this second paper, which also failed while the data survived. The surviving data then revealed patterns in the date framework that would never have been discovered otherwise.

Every test removes possibilities. Every failure removes assumptions. Every surviving clue becomes more valuable because it has survived one more attempt to disprove it. This is what Low Rents meant when he argued that imagination must be disciplined by constraint. Constraint is not the enemy of imagination. Constraint is the mechanism that allows imagination to become useful. A theory must be allowed to fail. When it does, the goal is not to defend it, but to instead examine what remains standing after the failure. Rabbit holes do not lead us astray; they reveal what survives the catastrophe of being wrong. In the end, the question is not which clue is correct. Which clue refuses to die? In the next paper, we will attempt to reuse the dataset one more time in a Venn diagram.

RAW DATA

Introduction

Date References

• American Revolution → 1776 (inferred historical anchor)
• Over 1,000 years (Alexander influence)
• Over 2,000 years (Christian influence)

Chapter 1 — The 120 Carat Sapphire

Subtitle: A Plan that Changed the World

• 1975 California, San Francisco Bay Area
• 1971 Bill Fernandez, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak
• 1975 Menlo Park, California, Homebrew Computer Club, Apple I
• 1977–1981 Mike Scott captained Apple
• 1980 Apple went public
• 1981 Mike Scott stepped down as Apple CEO

Chapter 2 — The 100 Gold Rings of Tuyet Nguyet

Subtitle: Don’t Wing It

• 1970 Nguyet and husband founded Arts of Asia
• July 2017 Arts of Asia published 100 Rings article
• Pre-Angkor period between 1st and 8th century AD
• 200–300 BC gold jewelry dates back to
• 250 AD India people traveled westward
• 2nd century AD maritime Champa culture
• 8th century–1431 Khmer reign
• 1145 AD Champa succumbed to Khmer
• 1146 AD Champa navy overthrew Khmer

Anomaly Note

• Book associates Angkor with filming of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
• Actual filming association appears to be Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001).

Chapter 3 — A Puzzle Box, A Magnifying Glass & The Mysterious Egg

Subtitle: Joy is in the Details

• 2015 JCB goes to Japan
• May 22, 1860 Michael Perkhin born
• Age 16 worked with local blacksmith
• Age 26 earned work master title
• Easter 1886 Tsar Alexander III commissions Imperial Egg
• 1917 egg lost
• 2024 egg found in Midwest USA
• 1917–2012 ownership history uncertain

Collection Notes

• 1860 + 16 = 1876
• 1860 + 26 = 1886

Chapter 4 — The 96 Carat Chivor Emerald

Subtitle: Blaze the Path

• 300 million year old sandstone
• Early 1980s rock and mineral collecting hobby
• 1474 story shifts from Europe to New World
• 1492 Columbus approaches Queen Isabella
• 1537 Chivor mine discovered
• 1675 Pope ends holy war and mining stops
• 200 years Chivor lost to jungle
• 1880 Chivor rediscovered

Chapter 5 — Masterworks by Art Smith

Subtitle: An Exercise in Faith

• April 19, 1879 birth of Mary Elizabeth Williams
• July 21, 1920 Mary and husband sail from Cuba to New York
• 1934 there were no commercially successful black artists in the USA
• October 1935 New York World’s Fair Corporation created
• 1930s engineering one of the few prestigious professional tracks available to black men

Chapter 6 — Rubies to Wear

Subtitle: Inspiration is Welcome

• Over the past ten years JCB found inspiration in meditation

Chapter 7 — Amelia’s Autograph

Subtitle: Explore More

• December 28, 1920 Amelia attends air show
• 1928 first woman to fly across Atlantic
• May 20, 1932 solo Atlantic flight
• May 21, 1937 around-the-world attempt
• June 11, 1937 disappearance

Historical Anchor Note

• Frank Borman quote
• Apollo 8 launch date researched separately as December 21, 1968

Chapter 8 — Beauty’s Bespoken Treasures

Subtitle: Know the Past, See the Future

• 1830 Indian Removal Act
• 500 BC Hopi migrated north from Mexico
• 1921 Charles Loloma born
• Age 20 recognized as mural artist
• 1962 bracelet incorporating ironwood
• 1963 Paris
• 1964 necklace gifted to Queen of Netherlands
• 2,500 years ago Hopi migrated north
• Late 1800s Hopi land seized

Special Artifact

• Hopi Lunar Calendar pictured in book

Chapter 9 — The Golden Chalice

Subtitle: Confirmation Bias

• 600–1000 BC gold vessel made
• 900 BC Chavín de Huántar
• Christmas Eve story (December 24)

Chapter 10 — Jackie Onassis’ Diamond Sapphire Brooch

Subtitle: Welcome the Good and the Bad

• November 22, 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy

Chapter 11 — Treasures from a Famous Shipwreck

Subtitle: The Temptress Greed

• July 2, 1752 at 10:00 AM Montevideo narrative
• 1993 wreck discovered
• 1750 coin references
• Gold disk stamped XIV on one side and XX on the other

Anomaly Note

• Book says Montevideo, Brazil
• Montevideo is in Uruguay

Additional Note

• Wreck reportedly found fifty miles from Montevideo Bay

Chapter 12 — Massive Gold Rush Nugget

Subtitle: Make Good Choices

• 1562 California named by Spanish explorers
• 1821 Mexican War of Independence
• January 24, 1848 gold discovered near Sutter’s Mill
• 1848 California transferred to United States
• December 1848 Polk announces gold
• 1849 approximately 90,000 prospectors
• 1850 approximately 189,000 prospectors
• 1850 migration surge
• 1850 immigrant miner fee
• 1852 large mining groups dominate

Chapter 13 — The Best of its Class Michael Jordan Rookie Card

Subtitle: Be Like Mike

• 1982 NCAA championship
• 1986 Fleer Rookie Card
• 1990s Michael Jordan commercials

Chapter 14 — Tiffany’s Furnace and Thoreau’s Fire

Subtitle: Fail Forward

• 1900 Tiffany Glass Iris
• 1882 Chester Arthur commissions Tiffany
• 1892 Favrile technique developed
• 1900 Paris presentation
• 13th century BC Egyptians used enameling
• 1933 Tiffany discontinued enameling
• April 30, 1844 Thoreau fire
• 1851 journal page written
• October 16, 1859 Harpers Ferry quote

Chapter 15 — 1960 Rome Olympic Gold Medal

Subtitle: Don’t Give Up

• 1960 Rome Olympics
• 1896 first modern Olympics
• 1956 Melbourne Olympics
• 1950s social norms
• 1984 Muhammad Ali diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease
• 1996 Atlanta Olympics

Chapter 16 — 1996 Atlanta Olympics

Subtitle: Defy Expectations

• 1996 Atlanta Olympics
• 1863 England men’s national soccer team founded
• 1949 Nigerian men’s national soccer team formed
• 1996 Olympic qualification discussion
• 1996 Sunday Oliseh joins team
• 1996 Brazil reference

Chapter 17 — George Washington’s Jelly Glass

Subtitle: Share Your Story

• Late June 1778 Battle of Monmouth
• November 27, 1790 Washington residence in Philadelphia
• December 14, 1799 Washington dies at Mount Vernon

Chapter 18 — Andrew Carnegie’s Emerald

Subtitle: The Science of Giving

• 1848 Carnegie moves from Scotland to Pittsburgh
• 1889 Gospel of Wealth
• 1901 steel company sold to J.P. Morgan
• 1904 Carnegie funds Mount Wilson Observatory
• 1917 Hooker Telescope erected

Chapter 19 — Moon Rocks & Meteors

Subtitle: The Next Frontier

• September 28, 1987 – May 23, 1994 Star Trek: The Next Generation
• 2024 science fiction becoming reality
• 2021 moon rock meteor purchase
• 2017 Sahara meteorite
• 1969 moon voyage reference
• 2019 Aguas Zarcas meteorite
• 1969 Murchison meteorite

Chapter 20 — The Six-Figure Birthstone

Subtitle: Choosing a New Perspective

• No dates identified

Chapter 21 — Antiquities of Alexander

Subtitle: Make it Make Sense

• 336 BC Alexander becomes king
• 776 BC inaugural Olympic Games
• 100 BC–100 AD bracelet period

Chapter 22 — Picasso’s Pendant

Subtitle: A Love Story

• 1882 Picasso born
• 1956 pendant made
• April 8, 1973 Picasso dies
• April 1973 Picasso death reference
• 2013 JCB met wife
• 2017 family began

Collection Note

• Age 91 relationship confirms 1973 death year

Chapter 23 — Sing Your Own Special Song

Subtitle: Finding Treasures Along the Way

• 1000 BC faience bead necklace reference

Current Anomaly List

1. Angkor associated with Raiders of the Lost Ark rather than Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.
2. Montevideo listed as Brazil rather than Uruguay.
3. Roman numerals XIV and XX on shipwreck artifact remain unexplained.
4. Hopi Lunar Calendar preserved for separate analysis.
5. Only explicit date-and-time entry in entire collection:
• July 2, 1752 — 10:00 AM.