100 Oz Nugget Sold For $400,000

Free publicity helps. After imaginations were captured by the find of the 100 oz nugget, the prize was auctioned off yesterday. Two minutes of frenzied bidding led to the buyer paying more than three times the gold value of the nugget. Including fees, the winning bidder had to cut a cheque for $460,000.

The Washington Nugget, which fits in one hand, weighs 8.2 pounds and would have fetched something less than its flat value of $137,744 at current gold prices, considering it has a few rock veins shooting through it.

But this isn't merely meltdown gold. This chunk has a story....

If not for a few fateful twists of many shovels, the Washington Nugget might have been found 150 years ago as prospectors extracted millions of dollars worth of gold from the hills and streams around Washington. Instead, the finder pinged it with a metal detector last March.

The finder and the auctioneers have jealously guarded his name for his protection - same with the name of the man who bought the nugget. All the co-auctioneer, coin dealer Don Kagin of Tiburon, would say Wednesday was that the buyer was from "back East," and the seller was "very pleased."

The actual sale price was $400,000. Thus ends the story of a truly lucky find...

...unless the nugget gets stolen.