A while back, the print version of California Monthly had an article, by Kevin Starr (the California State Historian), that revealed the solution to the mysterious origin of the faux Drakean brass plate found in the '30s near San Quentin. Seems that George Ezra Dane and some other members of E Clampus Vitus were playing a joke on Cal's eminent history professor and fellow ECV member, Herbert Eugene Bolton. The findings were published in the California History magazine after eleven years of research. Looking around the web disclosed some great sites about Drake, the possible locations of the bay in North America where he stayed for a couple of months, and the brass plate hoax: