World's Fair Co.
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Treasure Island Treasure Hunt

A weekend experiment: a treasure hunt through the history of San Francisco’s 1939 World’s Fair.

A postcard from the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition on Treasure Island, held up across the water from the island and the Bay Bridge

About the project

Treasure Island was built in San Francisco Bay to host the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition. We wanted a fun way to share that history, so we turned the island into a geocache treasure hunt.

Players took the ferry over and followed clues from cache to cache, picking up stories from the fair along the way. The last cache held the treasure: a letter, and World’s Fair poster prints for the first three finders.

It was a simple weekend experiment, and a fun one, until someone stole the treasure.

Photos

  • Getting the caches ready, with a postcard from the 1939 fair
    Getting the caches ready, with a postcard from the 1939 fair.
  • On the ferry to Treasure Island
    On the ferry to Treasure Island.
  • One of the caches
    One of the caches.
  • Arriving on the island
    Arriving on the island.
  • Inside each cache, a clue to the next: “Take a seat to appreciate Strauss’s Mighty Task.”
    Inside each cache, a clue to the next: “Take a seat to appreciate Strauss’s Mighty Task.”
  • Taking a seat, with the Golden Gate Bridge across the bay
    Taking a seat, with the Golden Gate Bridge across the bay.
  • Looking at photographs from the 1939 fair
    Looking at photographs from the 1939 fair.
  • A bit of fair history in every cache, like Daniel Burnham’s “Make no little plans.”
    A bit of fair history in every cache, like Daniel Burnham’s “Make no little plans.”
  • The treasure
    The treasure.

Thanks

Thank you to Andy, Sarah, Lily, Yash, Tom, and Mo, who tested the hunt first.

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