Scott Wolter

It's quite heavy.

That is about 31 inches long, about 15 1⁄2 inches wide, 5 1⁄2 inches thick.

That has a long inscription carved in Scandinavian runes.

This artifact was found by a Swedish immigrant farmer who was clearing trees.

He was homesteading his property back in 1898.

And he was clearing trees in preparation for farming with his two oldest sons.

And he cut the roots off around the base of a tree, as he said, in a written affidavit that's on file at the Minnesota Historical Society.

And then he took a winch and tipped the tree over, which also pulled up the stump at the same time, and tightly wrapped in the roots of that tree was...

this 202-pound stone.

And it was the younger son, Edward, who was nine, about to turn 10 at the time, who noticed that there was an inscription carved on it.

Now, they initially thought that it was an Indian almanac, but it was quickly realized that it was carved in Scandinavian runes.

And what happened back then that really set the table for the next 100 and what has it been, 28 years or something like that,

a copy of the inscription that was made by Olaf Oman was sent to Olus Breda, who was a professor of Scandinavian languages at the University of Minnesota, the expert in the United States at the time.

And he looked at the inscription and didn't recognize half of the symbols.

He certainly didn't recognize the pentatic numbers.

He didn't know what the hooked X was.

And basically, instead of saying...

Those three little words.

I don't know.

I don't know.