ASTORIA, Ore. - One man tried - and failed -for a marathon 14 hours. Another with an MIT pedigree could not come up with the right combination. Dozens of other professionals eventually gave up the effort as well.

They were all locksmiths and safecrackers, trying to crack a tough customer: a one-ton, 159-year-old safe found in an old building along Astoria's historic Cannery Row district.

No one knew what was inside, and new owner Floyd Holcomb was not about to use modern technology to breach the squat lockbox.

He decided to go the old-school route and put forth a challenge to the shadowy world of safecrackers: give it your best shot.

Word got around.

Thirty safecrackers came, and each left in frustration. The safe remained locked tight.

Rumors were beginning to go around that the complicated combination lock on the Hall Safe and Lock vault was pick-proof.

That was until Longview, Wash. locksmith Tom Gorham, owner of Lock Doc, gave it a go. Two hours later the tumblers fell into place and the thick, steel door, which is decorated on the inside, finally swung open.

Holcomb thought Gorham was pulling his leg when he said he'd opened the safe.

"We were all just saying "no way, "" Holcomb said. "We had the Coast Guard classified document guys out here, the guys that open the classified safes because the captain [of the Coast Guard ship] forgot the combination."

They had no luck opening the heavy black box.

"Sometimes you get lucky," Gorham said. He said he used a pen, paper, patience and experience to sniff out the combination.

So what was inside? Holcomb is tight-lipped. Gorham, who was the first person to see the inside of the safe, is sworn to secrecy.

Holcomb said he will let the world know what was in the safe after conferring with Cannery Foundation board members. An announcement is due in June.

Until then, there are more rumors that some old cans of seafood were inside. Gorham says he's just happy he was the person to get the old safe open.

"It feels good," he said, "It feels really good just to do something that most people, if you handed them the combination, couldn't do it."

The small, working-class city of Longview, Wash. is just a few dozen miles up the Columbia River from the popular coastal tourist town of Astoria, Ore. Both communities sit on the shores of the Columbia River.