Et tu, Brute?

The demise of the History Hunters International website, historyhuntersinternational.org, saddens us deeply. In fact, we’re nearly distraught. What will we do with our lives now?

In all seriousness, it seems that we get many visitors who also enjoyed HHI, albeit for different reasons, and in different ways than we did. To those people: We share your loss and share our sympathies. HHI presented a rich forum for a great number of people to share like interests and experience. Unfortunately, HHI was run by misanthropic, egotistical, megalomaniacal goofballs who gathered a very small following in terms of the overall population of HHI.

It is the actions of these few individuals, John Bartram and Jim McManus and their small posse of sycophants, that brought our attention to the site. The site provided us with barns' full of fodder (and excrement) for amusement over the past few months. We will truly miss them as a form of entertainment, but we are curious as to what actually occurred.

We suppose it would be best to leave sleeping dogs lie, but untruths piss us off.

On December 7, 2008, the HHI account of Jim McManus, a co-founder of HHI and known as “Diving Doc” on HHI, and generally “Doc,” was revoked. Roughly two days later, HHI was inaccessible. Clearly one of those things makes you go “hmmmm...”

Out damn’d spot!

We must ask ourselves why HHI would deny McManus’ ability to post. (For the record, his past posts were not removed and he was not “banned,” the punishment of choice for disagreement with the privileged few on HHI – more on this later.)

Let’s see now: The core of HHI – Bartram, McManus and a supposedly accredited archaeologist named “Vince” – obviously intended to use the HHI site as a marketing platform for “services.” A lot of effort went into constructing the site. But then, one of the founders created a fine mess for himself in the way of a libel suit brought against him. The lawsuit was brought by Odyssey Marine Exploration based on false and malicious statements made by McManus on the Yahoo! message board. This fine mess rolled over into HHI as the sycophants leapt on the honey wagon.

We have consistently pointed out the growing disconnect between McManus and Bartram over the months since the filing – at first Bartram seemed fairly supportive, albeit somewhat reluctantly. Then we saw Bartram grow a bit impatient with McManus’ assertions and rambling nonsense. A few of the sycophants, notably Sat Diver (who is also smithvi2003 on Yahoo!) and Scribe, joined with McManus on HHI in a continuation of nonsense and unsupportable conclusions.

A lawsuit was inevitably filed in Tampa, FL, and we have documented much of the interesting defense McManus presented. But then, in August, McManus filed for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy.

As we’ve recently learned, it now appears McManus misstated some things on his Bankruptcy filing. A few weeks after the original filing the U.S. Government involved itself in the form of the U.S. Trustee, specifically investigating abuse of the Bankruptcy Code. McManus’ bankruptcy filing lists approximately $238,000 in credit card debt.

Apparently, and as we had earlier suggested based on a reliable tip from someone in the know, the $25,000 sailboat McManus still had listed for sale at the time of his Bankruptcy filing didn’t find its way into the listing of assets. Nor did the $30,000 underground radar unit he has bragged to many as having purchased for HHI (or for HHI use). Nor did his alleged possession of weapons and coins. It appears to us that the sale of the sailboat was indeed uncovered and McManus amended his list of assets on December 16, 2008, to include a $6,800 receivable (money owed to him) on the sale of the sailboat. It is a felony to sell assets prior to a bankruptcy filing and not report it. We would imagine the creditors – largely American Express – will be very interested to learn what he did with the significant amount of money he received at the time of the sale.

Obviously, McManus’ deceitful and even potentially illegal activities caused the head HHI megalomaniac, Bartram, a bit of concern. What if, for example, American Express comes to retrieve the underground radar unit? What are the implications regarding Bartram’s “important contacts” within HMG if the close association with a proven liar and potential felon became known? What of his soapbox and congregation?

Talk about a rock and a hard place!

We imagine a very difficult decision was reached. We have no insight into the reasons behind ousting McManus or any revelations or deliberations involved. The result was McManus was silenced on HHI the night of December 7, 2008.

Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a worm scorned (apologies to William Congreve, not only for the morph of this line, but several of his famous lines are often confused with our Shakespeare theme).

Just a day or so later, POOF!, the HHI website disappeared.

Despite the eventual disclaimers placed on HHI, the facts are clear: The original “FORBIDDEN” message (which one would normally see if prevented from accessing a site by a firewall or the site itself) also contained information that the error-handler delivering the message couldn’t access the files needed to respond intelligently. The site was there – the files were gone. It’s just that simple. The message came from the HHI site. There was no “Denial of Service” at all.

It appears to us that this was no outside “attack” of any form. Someone with administrator rights simply deleted the HHI website. It is a common hobby for some to attempt to disrupt a website or even hundreds of them using widely published security flaws within the hacker community. It’s a game to them

As incomprehensible as this may seem, this appears to be what occurred. One person took it upon him or herself to simply erase HHI. Who on earth could this be? What is even more incomprehensible is there apparently was no backup of the site.

A few years ago, McManus got himself removed, along with all of his posts, from TreasureNet.com. As we recall, McManus had over 2,000 posts deleted from TreasureNet. He was furious! He blamed Odyssey “pumpers” for his dismissal from that site and began to libel Odyssey with a vengeance on the Yahoo! Finance board which, as we have seen, resulted in unwanted attention from the company. It also seems to have fostered a deep hatred for a Jeff K9 (on Yahoo!) whom McManus thinks is the same person as “Jeff from PA” who moderated the TreasureNet forum. This is not so, but it doesn’t bother McManus.

We seriously wonder how he would react to his own hive tossing him out the door.

Cowards die many times before their deaths

Let’s see…

nauticalresearch
laughinggull51
mcaguy13
intelcall22
deep_lurker
deep_lurker_2
deep_lurker_too
frigatamercedes
margle99
shipwrecksrus
charleyfrett
deepdiverkw
goldescudo
divingdoc
gldnfleez...and surely more

Our confidence level is 90 percent plus that McManus is all of the above, mostly dead, Yahoo! ID’s. Many of them once supported one another in conversation. That’s weird, no?

We’re talking about a man (in the gender sense only) on a mission here….Given the nature and substance of McManus’ “mission,” one may alternatively allude to psychopathic behavior, but we are not here to judge, nor are we qualified to make such a diagnosis - rather our goal is to simply bring fact to the forefront and allow folks to draw their own conclusions.

Eye of newt, and toe of frog, wool of bat, and tongue of dog, adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting, lizard's leg, and howlet's wing; For a charm of powerful trouble, like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Whew – what a mix! But in keeping with raising the worm theme, we are without other words to describe the depth to which McManus has apparently reached. His few “friends” must certainly now be enemies. At any rate, it would be better for them to disavow all knowledge or association with him. But can they?

McManus has single-handedly robbed hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of well-meaning hobbyists, contributors and just curious folks of a well-produced forum of educational interest.

How can McManus get away with that? Why isn’t Bartram up in arms? He seems less of a coward than a blowhard, although the two facets dwell closely. Our thinking is McManus has something on Bartram. Something that Bartram does not want revealed.

Looking at the formula above – the “blind worm’s sting” stands out – as does “a charm of powerful trouble.”

'Tis better to be vile than vile esteemed, when not to be receives reproach of being, and the just pleasure lost, which is so deemed not by our feeling, but by others' seeing.

So is it with McManus, who would appear to embrace the betrayal of former allies as some form of justice for not recognizing his genius…or delusion. After all, his prophesy still rings – “I shall be destroyed, but I will be heard.”

Apparently, and through his actions on HHI, Yahoo! and other forums, McManus deems himself the only one worth hearing. This strikes us as comical as the same tactics have failed in grand fashion when viewed in light of the histories of Hitler, Mussolini, Amin and Hussein. While the similar antics of Lenin, Stalin, Mao etc. remain largely written off in terms of fitting punishment, we cannot help but chuckle that McManus even pretends to place himself in a similar despotic position.

Napoleon was punished, and he was short also.

To be, or not to be, that is the question: whether ‘tis nobler in mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of trouble and by opposing end them.

This is likely the same question that likely went through the minds of Jim Jones, Charles Manson, Vernon Wayne Howell (who took the name David Koresh), John Wayne Gacy and every other person who showed absolutely no regard for others, even those who believed in them, in pursuit of their own dreams of grandeur or whatever.

While there is certainly no comparison in terms of the level of violence and physical harm, it would appear McManus took the same latter approach as those listed above. Rather than suffer the slings and arrows, he chose to cast them. It should, then, come as no surprise to anyone that McManus’ existence depends on his ability to be heard. Apparently he feels he has no worth otherwise. TreasureNet found reason to silence him. History Hunters found reason to silence him. What rage is boiling? There may be reason for some people to cautious.

The good news is that McManus is short, weak, has no money, no friends and no teeth. All he has as a weapon is to betray everyone who took him into confidence.

And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.

Therefore, it comes as no surprise to us that McManus has already given birth to a new History Hunters International site, in which McManus more correctly describes the demise of the original site than HHI did. He states the former site was attacked and defaced, claims credit for the origination of the entire idea of HHI, publishes a copyright going back to 2002, does not mention anyone who helped along the way and tersely states “it’s about time” for a new site.

Imagine the power this man must wield to so summarily dismiss the interests of hundreds of members of the site it appears he may have single-handedly erased!

Could it be that McManus’ sought acceptance through HHI so strongly that it drove him to bankruptcy? Could it be that everyone in McManus’ life wants to stifle him? Could it be that this small person sees himself in a completely different way than the rest of the world? Could it be that McManus is the last bastion of sanity in this crazy world? We’ll leave a full expose’ to Dan Brown, who in our opinion is the only person capable of dealing with such deeply threaded and totally unsupported conspiracies in a manner that puts food on the table.

O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!"

On our part, we are convinced that Captain Jim McManus, a co-founder of History Hunters International, deliberately erased the entire website because his posting ability was restricted. McManus’ hissy fits are notoriously well known among his acquaintances.

We are equally certain that McManus is a black hole – what few friends he may have had, and a website enjoyed by a bunch of innocent folks who didn’t even know him or how harmful he can be, are gone, likely forever. In our opinion, it is only a matter of time before he consumes what is left of himself.

Something wicked this way comes

In the mean time, we will continue to watch with interest the developments stemming from the violent hijacking of the History Hunters International site….