Explore New Mexico Treasure Tales

Buried Gold of the Malpais

Caballo Canyon Treasure

Jesse James Gold at Santa Clara Indian Reservation  Joe Suazo, a Santa Clara Indian, was arrested in 1962 in Albuquerque, New Mexico for refusing to divulge the location of $645,000 in gold bullion he had previously located on a mountain in the Santa Clara Reservation with Jesse L. James of Manitou, Colorado, who claimed his grandfather, the notorious Missouri bandit Jesse James, had given him the gold and told him how to find it.  The loot was not from robberies, but was 1,260 pounds of 90-pound gold ingots collected to finance a hoped-for second rebellion in the South.  When the gold was first found by the pair, the snow was too deep to carry it away, so they decided to wait, but Suazo went back and moved the gold to another location without telling James, and said he would not reveal its location until the "spirits" told him to so James filed a lawsuit against him.