Picture this: prepubescent me, seventh grade, end of the school year. My teacher doesn’t have any plans, so what does he do? Throws on the movie National Treasure featuring Nicholas Cage and Diane Kruger. I was never the same after that. 

The idea that a complex series of riddles and puzzles are hidden in and about America’s most historic landmarks, leading to the treasure of the ages is enough to make any kid go “oh my god, American history has never been so approachable and exciting.”

Picture one year later. Still prepubescent, but now I’m in Washington D.C. on a school field trip. 

Everything is fine and dandy until I see it: the Declaration of Independence. I approach, lemon juice at the ready, about to be the richest eighth grader in the world, when a security guard stops me. 

Imagine my disappointment when I’m told that “it was just a movie” and that “I need to leave the Library of Congress immediately.”

As disappointed as I was, that didn’t stop me from uncovering the conspiracy that was being hidden from me. 

Except, as it turns out, there’s, like, a lot of evidence that National Treasure is a fake story. 

But I want to be able to go on a grand, trans-America adventure. I want to be able to piece together an elaborate set of clues. I want to pee in the skull of Andrew Jackson’s eye socket to unlock a secret passageway in Hermitage. 

All that brings me to the point of my argument: America needs an elaborate scavenger hunt leading to unbridled fame and ancient fortune. 

From a public relations standpoint alone, it’s sure to get other countries talking. Sure, Italy has its World Heritage sites, and Sweden has  things like affordable healthcare that make them popular among the world’s nations. But if word gets out that there’s buried treasure somewhere in the U.S.… we’ll be the talk of the town for a good, long while. 

Ultimately this will improve foreign relations, as foreign representatives will try to butter up to the U.S. in an attempt to learn more about the treasure, which, like usual, we can then use to our advantage by extorting said foreign nations to do our bidding under the promise of economic liberty and fortune. 

Not to mention that America’s tourism industry and interstate commerce will be booming with our nation’s citizens (as well as some overseas fortune seekers) racing state to state to get their greedy mitts on the treasure.

Let’s also consider patriotism. That’s right, if there’s one thing ol’ Uncle Sam and Lady Liberty love, it’s proud patriot’s supporting the U.S. of A.  

And in an era of questionable acts under the guise of American patriotism leading half of an entire generation to grow up pretty much hating their country, it would be a good idea to maybe sway the opinion of the U.S. back to the positive side. 

I think if we’re gonna promote American pride and history, it might as well be in a fun, edu-tainment kind of way. 

What better way to learn about America’s bravery in the heart of oppression than by looking for hidden messages written in the Declaration of Independence? 

Why not learn about the horrors of the seventh U.S. presidency by, say, peeing in Andrew Jackson’s miserable, deplorable eye socket? When you make learning history fun, with the added benefit of millions of dollars in gold bullions (1)  as an endgame reward, it gets kids excited to be American again.

But I hear you all asking, “where would we get the money to even make a hidden stash of wealth somewhere in America?” To which I say, if we’re gonna have a multi-million dollar lottery system in each state, this really shouldn’t be a problem, but I’ll offer a solution anyway. 

You know how Bernie Sanders got really popular for wanting to tax the rich? Yeah, something like that.

 Look, they’re just hoarding their money, contributing literally none of it to the economy, so if they really want it back they can do the scavenger hunt just like the rest of us blue collar folk.  We already talked about how this idea is gonna exponentially raise America’s profit gain, so it’s really like America’s billionaires are contributing something for once.

America’s government has failed us for a multitude of reasons, but arguably the biggest fault that has ever been made under the U.S. government is the failure to implement the lost treasures of an ancient secret society as the reward to a zany treasure hunt into the American population. 

However, since I have such little faith in the president (whomever they may be by the time this issue comes out), I have, instead, gone ahead with a different solution. I have made my own treasure hunt limited to the Xavier campus. 

Hidden somewhere in this article is the first clue to finding the long lost Xavier treasure. It is first come, first serve. Good luck!