Rural Mysteries of the North Fork Polygon

Legend of the Colfax Buddha Heads

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The Sound of One Town Clapping

It's a mystery of history and hope, art and intrigue, greed and karma, and a search for the truth ... oh, and also media spin. Not suprisingly, the solution to this mystery raises more questions than answers.

In August 2005, a local gold miner found hundreds of tiny buddha heads in the North Fork of the American River near Colfax. When word got out in January 2006, a legend was born.

In summary: Gold miner finds Buddha heads, miner sells some to T-shirt shop owner, T-shirt shop owner searches for truth on Internet, tattletale calls Feds, Feds take Buddha heads, T-shirt shop owner discovers the truth, Feds return Buddha heads.

Here's a compilation of the flurry of news stories published during the first quarter of 2006:

The legendary Buddha heads are on display at BETTER THAN NAKED T-Shirts and Gifts in downtown Colfax. There is also a lecture series scheduled to be held at the Miners Foundry in Nevada City. A documentary film crew is considering making a movie about the legend of the Colfax buddha heads.

Here's some excerpts from the above news stories:

History or hoax? That's the question many people are asking in the Placer County town of Colfax after a local prospector claims he found hundreds of little Buddha figurines along the American River.(Sacramento Channel 13, Feb 24, 2006)

Federal agents have seized about 230 Buddha heads from a Colfax man who thinks they could date back to the 12th century. "They didn't give me a receipt or nothing," he said. (GV Union, Feb 24, 2006)

"It was two prospectors swapping treasures," Bowers said. (Colfax Record, Feb 25, 2006)

The thumb-sized, white carvings may be hundreds of years old. And now federal and state investigators are looking into the discovery and are looking for Mr. Henry. (CBS Channel 13, Mar 3, 2006)

Bowers' said his research into the heads indicated they may be ancient artifacts. (GV Union, Mar 7, 2006)

The figurines whipped up a storm of interest after federal agents visited Jim Bowers' Better than Naked T-Shirts and Gifts shop in Colfax on Feb. 22 and confiscated two dozen of them.(Colfax Record, Mar 8, 2006)

But the Buddhas have brought anything but good karma to Colfax, a Placer County town 50 miles northeast of Sacramento off Interstate 80. Before the mystery was finally solved with a couple of phone calls, all this happened: The janitor went for advice to a T-shirt shop; the guy at the shop started doing his own rudimentary research; word got out; people got excited; some folks paid $100 for a single coin-sized figure; federal authorities showed up and seized the pieces under threat of arrest; the janitor went to jail on outstanding warrants. And the whole town of 1,500 was in a tizzy. (Sac Bee, Mar 4, 2006)

Rural Mysteries of the North Fork Polygon