Winter Carnival Medallion Found In New Brighton

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- A Fridley man is $10,000 richer after cracking the code to an annual Twin Cities tradition.

John "J.C." Collins found the Pioneer Press St. Paul Winter Carnival Medallion overnight. He says he located it about 10 minutes after the twelfth and final clue came out.

He showed us how he found it at Long Lake Regional Park in New Brighton.

"It had been a long time coming, I had rehearsed that moment for decades," Collins said.

He has been looking for the medallion for years. He was just 4 when he first went out with his dad and brothers.

"The magic of the medallion hunt was just, went back to the earliest memories of childhood, and dad really started it all," Collins said.

This would finally be his year. After 12 clues, he found it, hidden about 10 paces off a path, wrapped in cardboard.

"My brother and I, we are very into 'The Price is Right' and we were like, 'You know what this is better than winning at 'The Price is Right' [laughs]!' Because we have been trying way longer than that," Collins said.

And how about that $10,000 prize?

"You know what I've been thinking about is Jayme Closs and the tragedy that she went through, and she's got a GoFundMe page and I think I'm going to give some money to her," he said.