Brown's Home - the Spot is Sweet

It is one thing to identify who Brown is, but it is the home of Brown that is required to answer the clue. One thing that has always been assumed by me that was absolutely wrong was my assumption that I could join the middle of the clues ( find home of Brown) and continue from there to the treasure. Mr. Fenn is adamant that the find must solve clue 1 first, but why? The first thing I have discovered is that the clue previous defines/hints to the next, but what makes this poem so difficult is that Mr. Fenn thought of ways to circumvent the short cut and here is how.

Brown is capitalized suggesting that Brown is a person. Yet the Brown I have found is not from the Rocky Mountains and never lived there, so it is easy to assume that this is the wrong Brown. Ah, but that is what makes this puzzle so great, it challenges out assumptions. The little girl from India can't get past clue two with only a map of the Rocky Mountains and the poem, so clue 3 ([put in below the] home of Brown) may not be in the Rocky mountains.

Before we discuss Brown's home, we have to look at the poem in it's entirety. Forrest has said most of the words are to be used and on sentence that I have misinterpreted is brave and in the wood because I did not consider literally what is "in the wood." Since the clues have lead us to baseball, in the wood refers to the "sweet spot" because it is "in" not on the wood. The big confirmer is "listen good" and the sound of a ball hitting the sweet spot of the bat with a crack.

Follow the star theory requires us to follow the baseball star Shoeless Joe Jackson, who we identified by his alias "Brown." His home his coincidentally in Greenville South Carolina, Forrest Fenn's first posting where he decided to become a pilot that was purposely omitted from his memoir because the solver of the poem is required to discover it. Over the years this information leaked out in his other stories as he felt it was necessary to lower the degree of difficulty.

Shoeless Joe's home was turned into a museum in Greenville and it is called "Sweet Spot." This is why his home can be outside the Rockies and explains why we can join into the clues midway. It is a descriptor not a physical place. The home of Brown is represented by sweet spot and it is up to the solver to follow the clues to this spot. The email to Mindy, “No one is looking AT the right spot” suggest the importance of spot.

Forrest Fenn was paid $100,000,000 for a clue from a little girl named Allison in scrapbook 132 and Forrest jokingly gave a clue, but it wan't a joke, he actually gave the answer to Brown's home. "I think you are made of sugar. Send me your address so I can give you some bubble gum." Sugar is sweet and bubble gum is synonymous with baseball players and so is the bubble gum brand Wrigley- a Chicago baseball park.

Many have already speculated that a baseball field myst be close, but there are many things that Mr. Fenn mentions also qualify and that is golf, the driver is a wood (pun on "in the wood" and tiger woods) and cricket paddle (no paddle up your creek) also has a sweet spot and is the sport of India (the little girl's home) and is also a creature you find when you roll over the log, which Forrest hints that searchers should do. The big hint that tie baseball to golf is the aberration Babe Ruth chocolate bar which is actually a Baby Ruth hinting to baseball and Baby Ruth was the candy bar that fell into the pool in the movie Caddyshack hinting to golf. Bowling is also a place that has a sweet spot in order to get a strike, and Mr. Fenn has cleverly hinted a searcher has been within "striking" distance to the treasure. Strike is also a baseball term and Forrest Fenn has used it many times to hint at the clues but never in his memoir:

"yeah I too threw a couple of strikes when I needed them"

"I wanted to strike out at tradition ..."

"I wanted it to be fancy enough to strike someone's fancy..."

"... grab a sleeping bag and strike the trai."

"strike-a-light"

Just when we think we have it made by solving Brown and his home, the true complexity of this puzzle is realized and we now have an understanding of Mr. Fenn's declaration that the poem is difficult but not impossible. We now know home of Brown is "Sweet Spot" and that is hinted and connected to the word home as in "Home Sweet Home" a song recorded by Carrie Underwood, we just have to keep following those clues to beneath the home of Brown but first lest summarize the progress in a simple way ...

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