Psst. Hey, it's your favorite secret host here from your favorite secret podcast.
Today I checked out a legendary European mystery that spawned a famous book series and one heck of a movie starring Tom Hanks, aka Winnie from Toy Story.
So don't go anywhere, I'm Carly Q.
and this is Who When Wow Mystery Edition.
history has been compiled some important details are slipped away in our spectacular shared existence we consider it a business to recognize a few vogs you may not know who is When I came into the office today, I tried my best to act normal and natural.
Where are you, Carly?
Nothing, just normal and natural.
Okay. When in reality, I was scrutinizing every last detail of every single interaction.
Okay, Carly Q? Have a good day.
Linda, is there some reason I wouldn't have a good day?
No, wait, what? Yeah, exactly.
What do you mean? As you may recall, last week I got a pretty crummy surprise.
All that good, okay.
A meanly and anonymous letter leapt out of my desk saying someone was on to us.
Yikes. Luckily, Lewis and I realized that instead of just being scared and intimidated by this, he should work to figure out who sent us the letter and why.
Phew, that went okay, right?
Carly Q, is that you?
Lewis, you're down here already?
Of course, we have work to do.
All week, I'd be compiling a list of potential suspects.
Co -workers and other staff members here at Butthead, the guy who owns the bodega down the street from me, and of course, at the top of the list, the mailman.
Since, you know, it was a letter.
But so far, none of them had panned out.
And I was feeling all caps frustrated that we hadn't cracked the case yet.
Nothing. I even tried buttering him up by buying a bunch of butter, but he wouldn't budge.
I don't think it's him.
My rat friend, Nibbles, was helping out with our strategy session, too.
That's exactly the problem, Nibbles.
I have to be careful how I ask, because I don't want to accidentally give away too much information to someone who doesn't know.
Seems like the Butthead bosses don't know.
It's been a week since we got the letter and everything's been quiet.
And I'm certainly grateful for that.
But I'm still extremely frustrated this mystery is still unsolved.
But just then... A new time field trial!
Event 1967. The Accursed Treasure of Remla Chatter.
Secret Society. A secret society?
A cursed treasure? Are we thrilled?
Or is it just me? Nothing lifts my spirits like a good bit of bad treasure.
You know, people say I'm a treasure.
I pulled out my handheld digital assistance device...
Exit online and ready to party.
And plugged in the clues from the file.
1967, secret society...
Thing with a French name I can't pronounce.
The Accursed Treasure of Remla Chatter is a book published in 1967 about the town of the same age.
A small village in southern France.
It's rumored to have hidden treasure and a connection to the secret society called the Priory of Cyon.
This all sounds vaguely familiar.
Elements of the town, its history and the Priory of Cyon were used as source material for the popular 2003 novel by Dan Brown called The Da Vinci Code.
Book emoji. Yes, I knew it.
I saw the Tom Hanks film adaptation like a hundred times.
And who doesn't love a good Tom Hanks film?
Haters of an American cinematic legend.
That too. Laughs like a box of chocolates.
There's no crying in baseball.
Wilson! Classics. Okay, H -Dad got any more info on - Tom Hanks was born in 1956 in Concord, California - No, no, no, no.
More info about the treasure.
Oh, right. The town's treasure is rumored to be in or around the town's church and is said to include millions of gold pieces and significant medieval documents.
Did he say millions?
A series of excavations of the late 1950s and early 60s found no evidence of treasure, but tens of thousands of tourists still descend on the town each year to look for it.
Wow. I wonder where it is.
Maybe in the bell tower, or the steeple, or the chapel, or the rectory, or the tabernacle.
Okay, you're just naming parts of a church.
Yeah, and - We tried to get more info out of H -Dad, but - Analyzing!
Analyzing! Analyzing!
So we decided to break till lunchtime.
Luckily, the rest of the morning flew by and all of a sudden - Attention Butthead employees!
It's Butter Sculpture Lunch Break!
Help yourself do an extra stick of butter with your lunch, then use the leftovers to make a butter sculpture!
That's lunch! I grabbed Nibbles and H -Dad and we took off for the elevator.
Hey, Odie! Basement Companion!
So nice to see you!
Lewis, it's - Well. Odie.
We've got a real juicy mystery today.
Ever heard of the hidden treasure at...
Renes Le Chateau? I believe I have.
This is a very intriguing story.
As I recall, it revolves around a number of colorful characters.
The central one is Pierre Plantard, the co -writer of a book about this place.
The accursed treasure of Renes Le Chateau.
That's right. But there's other important people in this story too.
Particularly a local hotel owner named Noel Corbut and his tale of a 19th century priest who initially discovered some of the treasure.
This is great! I love a good treasure hunt.
Can you send us back to 1967 when the book was published?
I can. And I suggest you start at Noel's Hotel.
L 'Hôtel de la Tour.
And go from there. Sounds like a plan!
Then a quick refresher on our time travel rules.
No changing the past.
Be back by the end of lunch.
And to ensure your safety on the return journey, you may want to consider bringing me back a freshly baked croissant.
You got it! Oh, and remember that the elevator's translation function will help you understand the local language.
Oui! That's French for a guess.
Oui, indeed. Then just remember, when you're at the chateau, mind the temple.
Okay. Here you go. Temple?
What temple? Conchants!
Wait! Wait! Temple!
How do we mind? Yay!
Hey, grown -ups! Mindy here from Wow in the World.
And let me tell you, Carly Q and I are so excited to make it wow in New York City...
I mean, New York! And San Francisco with our new live show, Make It Wow, presented by Audible.
There's more to imagine, would you listen?
And apparently, you're excited too, because our San Francisco performance is filling up and our New York City performance is almost sold out.
So we're adding even more wow with a second show for New York City.
Grown -ups, get your tickets today at tinkercast .com slash events.
That's tinkercast .com slash events.
That's it! We'll see you there.
We made it to Ren Le Chateau, what a charming little town!
Look at that view, same magnifica.
Whoa. We were on top of a hill surrounded by rolling fields in every direction and a clear blue sky overhead.
Bonjour, sky. Bonjour, rolling hills.
The town was all very old -timey with brick buildings and big stone walls.
I think I'd be bored living in a place like this, but I sure do love coming to visit.
Me too. Me three. Rats in these old towns really knew how to make the place there.
I bet they got some real good chores.
Gross, Nivels. Okay, we gotta learn more about the Hidden Treasure slash Secret Society here.
Let's start at the hotel.
We walked through the town and found the hotel, which was a large, beautiful stone house.
Nivels hid in my backpack as we found a charming husband and wife team manning the front desk.
Bonjour, welcome to the Hotel de la Tour.
Do you need a room?
No, actually we were hoping to speak to the owner, Noel Corbu.
Oh, no, Noel sold this place three years ago.
The owner is now Henri, but he's not in it right now.
Can we help you instead?
Sure. We just have some questions to ask.
You must be journalists reviewing that new book that came out, no?
Oh, yeah. That is us, literary critics extraordinaire, here to write about that very book.
What can you tell us about it?
Well, one of the authors, Pierre Planteart, is a very interesting figure.
He was here often the past few years doing research.
Much of his book was based on Noel's state.
And what exactly was that?
Before this was a hotel, it was a villa belonging to the town priest, back almost 80 years ago.
Now, how does a priest afford a fancy villa like this, you ask?
I didn't ask, but I do want to know.
In the early 1890s, the priest had become mysteriously wealthy.
Worthy from what? Noel had a theory.
Yes, we love theories.
When he bought the villa 15 years ago, he claimed to have learned a big secret.
That back in 1892, the priest had somehow found part of a vast treasure hoard while renovating the church, including gold and certain ancient documents.
But according to Noel, the priest had only found part of the treasure, meaning there's more still out there waiting to be found.
Which is why people have been coming here looking for it.
And there will surely be more now that Pierre has published his little book.
So Noel first introduces the story of the treasure, and now Pierre is popularizing it with his book?
Yes, but the claims in Pierre's book go even further.
According to him, the priest himself already had found the most important part of the treasure, a pair of medieval parchments that proved a long and storied history of a secret society called the Priory of Zion.
These medieval parchments, they are the cornerstone of Pierre's book.
I don't know why we are telling you all this about the book when obviously you have already read it.
Right, yes, of course we have.
We're writing a book report of...
A review! A review of it.
So, of course we've read it.
We are very intrigued by the, um...
stylistic choices. The formatting.
The font. Love the font, the font's great.
Uh... okay... One more question.
All of this secret society stuff aside, what about the actual treasure treasure?
You know, like the gold?
Yeah, is it real? And if so, where is it?
If we knew that, do you really think we will still be working here?
We all had a good chuckle at that.
It was a good point.
We thanked them for their time and left.
Outside on the street, Nibbles hopped out of my backpack.
What do you think, Nibbs?
It's your son's story.
I'm not sure what to believe though.
Yeah, me neither. These two guys, Noel and Pierre, it really seems like somebody's making something up, but I can't tell who.
Me neither. Simone said the Priests found the treasure back in 1892.
Could we go back then and see for ourselves?
I pulled out H -Dad to check the file.
Negatory. The time seal on this file covers the entire year of 1892.
Giant red X emoji. Well, it was a good idea, but I'm thinking we should just go check out this church ourselves.
Good thinking, Carly!
The church was just a few minutes away.
And what a church it was.
It was traditionally ornamented with lots of stone statues all around and beautiful stained glass windows.
An altar! Carly, you're just naming things in a church again.
Like, come on. Maybe we should split up.
I'll take the main floor.
Nibbles, you check the basement.
Carly, you take the tower?
Great plan. We each went off to explore our parts of the church.
I took a spiral staircase up to the top of the tower, which was just a simple stone platform surrounded by a wall so you wouldn't fall off.
The view was totally stunning.
Wow, what a view! But unfortunately, there wasn't much more to be found.
There weren't any secret latches or hidden compartments in any of these stones.
One of these stones comes loose?
Nope. And there wasn't really anything else up there.
Not even a rogue etching.
So, after a few minutes, I went back downstairs to find Louis.
Look, we'll find Louis.
Nothing down here. You?
Same. Nibbles popped up from the basement.
Nothing downstairs except some delightful old French rats.
Oh, I asked them about the treasure, but they don't know anything.
They haven't even seen Ratatouille.
Then I guess we're all empty -handed.
Okay. Let's recap. Noel buys the old priest's villa, and hears a story about there being buried treasure here that the priest found, including some documents that Pierre writes about in his book.
But so far, no more treasure has actually been found.
Anything I'm missing?
I think that's it. Then, H -Dad, have you finished analyzing yet?
We could really use some more info.
Affirmative. Pierre's book and the Priory of Sion's secret society captured people's imaginations everywhere, spawning a series of books in the 1980s that later inspired the DaVinci Co.
And the Tom Hanks movie.
Buzz, you're a toy.
No, not that one. But, the truth about Pierre's claims did not stay hidden forever.
For further information, fast forward to 1993.
1993? I wasn't expecting to visit the Nineties today.
Me neither. But let's go before the end of launch.
We rushed back to the elevator, punched in the coordinates for 1993.
Maybe we're going to be wearing cargo pants.
I don't know about the Nineties with the fashions every day.
I don't know about it, MacEacon!
The village looked pretty much the same.
There were a few new buildings, but the church was right there where we left it.
Not sure what we're looking for.
But I'm guessing it involves that mess of people over at that tavern.
Let's go see what's happening.
We hustled over right away.
The crowd was so big, it looked like it might have been the whole town gathered together.
As we walked up, people were shushing each other.
We finally got close enough to see that everyone was watching a TV screen.
And we arrived just in time to see a newscaster come on.
Right in, okay? Act Nineties.
Authorities made an inadvertent discovery today after searching the home of Pierre Plantard for an unrelated court case.
Mountains of evidence that he invented the sign of the primary of silence and fabricated the famous parchment proving its existence.
Documents that he claimed had been found in Rheil -ne -Chateau.
Oh no! Oh my gosh! He even admitted to planting other false documents in various locations around France, including Le Biviothèque -Nacional.
So they would seem to independently authenticate his claim.
I pulled Louis away from the crowd.
Did you hear that? Yeah, and I think I may have just put something together.
Noël had this whole story about the priest and the treasure, right?
Pierre must have heard that story and then decided to incorporate it into his priory of scion hoax to give it more juice.
Really? Really. Pierre made it seem like his parchments were part of what Noël's priest had initially found, which instantly helped attract more attention to his claim.
Wait, so Pierre just made it all up to get attention?
Affirmative. Pierre was essentially a con man, hoping to use his fake story to jockey for wealth, power, and influence.
Okay, but then what about the treasure?
Is there actually any gold anywhere or what?
No treasure has ever been discovered in Rheil -ne -Chateau.
Furthermore, her scholars now believe the source of the priest's mysterious wealth was simple fraud.
Illegal financial activities like keeping donations that were meant for the church.
Wow. So it's just nothing.
Noël appears to have exaggerated the claims of whatever he found in the priest's villa, who's likely to draw tourists to his hotel.
Well, I'll be. No treasure at all?
I'm devastated. You and me both, Nibs.
But nothing a good croissant can fix.
Incoming message from Butt -Head HQ.
Attention, Butt -Head employees.
Five minutes. I guess that's time.
Let's go get some croissants and get out of here.
We made a quick stop at the bakery.
You know what? We will take ten, all ten of these croissants, ran back to the elevator, and...
Of course we had to stop at a bakery.
It wasn't a trip without the croissants!
Welcome back. Mmm, is that the warm, buttery croissant I smell?
It sure is. Here you go.
Mmm. Delicious. Now, tell me, how was your trip to France?
Perfectly pleasant, except...
There's no treasure.
It was all made up.
Pierre and his whole Priory of Sion story was fake for sure.
And Noël's tale of the priest's treasure was almost certainly fake too!
I had wondered who in this story was lying, and it turns out it was all of them.
Even the priest. It's fakes upon fakes upon fakes over there.
Such a complex case.
And to think the real truth about everything didn't come out until 1993, over 25 years after Pierre first published his book.
It took a long time to unravel.
Wait a minute. I just figured it out!
That's what you meant with your riddle, Odie?
When you're at the chateau, mind the tempo.
In music, tempo refers to time, or the pace at which something happens.
Louis' point is exactly what you meant.
That we should take note of just how long it took for the truth about this town to finally come to light.
Exactly right, basement companion.
The fact is, sometimes things just take time.
Thanks, Odie. Great advice.
Enjoy the rest of that croissant.
Ooh, you have already finished it.
And it was wonderful.
Have a good day, basement companion.
You might as well have one too, Louis.
Louis walked me back to my desk where I told him I'd had a minor revelation.
Odie's advice about the tempo?
I'm wondering if it doesn't just apply to secret society treasure hunts, but maybe anonymous letter investigations too.
Oh? Just because we haven't cracked the case yet doesn't mean we never will.
I just need to give it some time.
True fact, I think that's right on the money, Carly Q.
Like I always say, life is like a box of chocolates.
You never know what you're gonna get.
Tom Hanks is for a scope.
I got that. Don't be so hard on yourself.
We'll figure this out.
Catch you later, Carly Q.
Yeah, we will. Thanks, Louis.
And with that, it was back to work.
But what an adventure.
Pretty wild to think how one priest illegally keeping some money in the 1890s led to a giant hoax, a flurry of treasure hunts, and a global book and movie franchise over a hundred years later.
Life is like a box of chocolates.
Sometimes you get that delicious caramel one, and sometimes the cherry liquid.
Gross. I'm still working through my list of suspects for the mystery letter, but I'll be solving more time sealed mysteries in the meanwhile.
So don't stay away.
Until next time, this is Carly Q signing off.
And remember, you never heard this.
H -DAD Initiating end credits mode.
Who Would Wow Mystery Edition is an original Tinkercast production with help from GZM shows.
Handshake emoji. High five emoji.
For Tinkercast, the executive producers are Guy Ross, Mindy Thomas, and Meredith Halpern -Ranzer.
The shows are written by Aaron Weissman, Susan Mwaddi -Darrage, and Tom Van Kalken.
The head writer for Tinkercast is Kenny Curtis and Carly Shiraki is a producing consultant.
Big shout outs to the rest of the Tinkercast team, including Jed Anderson, Jessica Bodie, Rebecca Caban, Natasha Crandall, Lizzie Freilich, Kristen Jang, Tui Mac, Erica Medina, Henry Moskle, Jodie Nussbaum, Ali Paxima, Linda Raufenberg, Steph Sosa, Tyler Thall, Joanna Weber, and Anna Zegorski.
Megaphone emoji. Applause emoji.
The Who Would Wow theme song was composed and performed by The Pop -Ups.
For more information on their three -time Grammy -nominated all -ages music, find them at thepopups .com.
Producers for GZM shows are David Kreisman, Ben Strauss, Chris Terry, Amy Servini, and Claire McClanahan.
The production manager is Sharon Michaels.
Sound design and editing for Who Would Wow Mystery Edition is done by Chris Terry and Oded Levaree.
Headphones emoji. Microphone emoji.
Thumbs up emoji. Original music was created by Jennifer Rokamp.
Voice editing is by Yoni Rekim, and voice direction is handled by David Kreisman and Amy Servini.
Uh, could you give me another one on that, please?
And voice direction is handled by David Kreisman and Amy Servini.
Our main cast features Carly Shiraki as Carly Q, Brandon Salerno as Lewis, Melissa Van Der Schiff as Nibbles the Rat, Kenny Curtis as H -Dad, and Angel Desai as Odie.
Help support Who Would Wow by becoming a member of the World Organization of Wowzers and discover wows all year long.
Sign up today at tinkercast .com slash membership.
You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at tinkercast .com slash YouTube for full -length episodes of Who Would Wow Mystery Edition.
And reach out to us at hello at tinkercast .com if you have a mystery you would like butthead to investigate.
H -Dad, powering off.
Peace sign emoji. Who Would Wow made important inventions?
Asked all the right questions, history will never be the same!
Who Would Wow was made by Tinkercast and sent to you by Wondery.
Shh, I'm sorry. GCM shows, imagination amplified.
