The Mystery of Oak Island Money Pit

Oak Island is a tiny island off the coast of Nova Scotia. In 1795, Daniel McGinnis, a teenage boy, noticed a strange circular depression in the ground, about 4 meters in diameter. When he looked more closely, he found that there was a very old tree with deep scars that spread its branches above this depression. He guessed that someone had used the tree branch for a rope and a pulley. Daniel immediately thought of pirates and buried treasure.

He came back with his friends, and they started to dig. 2 feet below the surface, they came upon a layer of flat stones. 10 feet down, they came upon a layer of oak logs. The boys were really excited, because they thought that the logs were covering a treasure. They were disappointed. There was a layer of oak logs at the 20 foot level and the 30 foot level.

By this time, the friends were very disappointed, and they stopped digging. Eight years later, the three friends formed a company, and started digging again. They found oak logs every 10 feet down to the ninety foot level.

At 90 feet, they found a rock with a message written in code. The message said: �forty feet below two million pounds are buried�.

The next day when the workers returned full of hope, their hole was full of water. The company made another hole near the original one, down to 100 feet. When they joined the two, they both filled with water. Pumps could not pump the water out, because there was a tunnel to the sea. The company stopped work, and no further digging was done for 45 years.

Since then, many different companies have worked there. Various things have been found, but to this day no one has found gold in the money pit.

Answer the questions in sentences:

1. Who do you think dug the hole on Oak Island?

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2. Why do you think they dug this hole?

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3. Some people say that the stone with the code is a joke. They say that the company digging the pit needed more money, so they put the stone there, to get rich people interested in their work. Do you think the stone was put there by the first people who dug the pit?

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You are on Oak Island 300 years ago. Write a paragraph. Your topic sentence tells us about the money pit.
Tell us:

-who you are __________________________________________________________

-how you got to the island _______________________________________________

-what you have in your ship ______________________________________________

-why you want to hide it in a hole _________________________________________

-Your last sentence should be about ______________________________________

-What happened to you. ________________________________________________

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