Missing 17th-century ship that inspired ‘Goonies’ found in Oregon
According to National Geographic, state officials confirmed that timbers from the shipwreck of the 17th-century Spanish galleon were found in sea caves earlier this week.The legend of the Santo Cristo de Burgos reportedly inspired filmmaker Steve Spielberg to dream up the idea for the 1985 movie — about a group of kids out to seek a sunken ship’s pirate booty and save their family homes from foreclosure.For 300 years, tales of the shipwreck spread, with the area’s indigenous tribes passing down the legend of a ship that had vanished off the Oregon coast around 1693, carrying porcelain, beeswax and pricey Chinese silk.The new discovery “confirms that our ancestral people knew what they were talking about,” Robert Kentta, cultural resources director for the Confederated Tribes of the Siletz and a member of the Siletz Tribal Council, told National Geographic.The recovery required a team of archeologists, law enforcers and search-and-rescue specialists, who have been searching for the past 15 years. According to National Geographic, powerful tides made for a tricky and dangerous operation that had to be perfectly timed.