small change
New member
Finally posting the finds from the first two weekends this month & we are almost at the third.
Sat. the 6th went to a school I had been to before & managed to find two Mercs ('17s & '24) along with 3 wheats. Also found some sort of pin from an old school rifle club I am guessing. Also found quite a bit of clad & a cheap looking kid's ring. After a few hours there I went a few miles over to another town's vacant lot along the main highway thru town. I had searched it a few years before & found mostly older clad but got lucky & found 3 Mercs together but that was the only silver found in the whole field then. This time I also found more older clad but did manage to get 5 wheats & luck into a '36 Merc. Left after about 3 1/2 hours or so. I was fighting a cold all day & didn't feel my best but it seemed tolerable.
Sat. night & into Sunday morning I didn't get much sleep & began to feel worse - more like the flu rather than a typical cold. Nevertheless I decided I was going to go out & try to hunt somewhere Sunday so I went to an old high school athletic field that had been productive for me since I started hunting in in 2006. It was pretty warm that day & the heat seemed to be bothering me more than usual due to being sick, even though I tried to stay in the shade somewhat. After a couple of hours & only getting a few clad coins I wondered over to a hillside where I hadn't found anything good before which has always frustrated me a little since it looks like a prime gathering spot & also since other flat areas nearby had been productive. I finally got a good signal near the bottom of the hill & pulled a '44d Merc from about 5-6". I then decided to call it quits as I was feeling pretty run down by then & didn't want to push myself any more. I ended up calling in sick to work Monday but did feel better enough to make it in Tuesday.
Sat. the 13th went back to the park where I found 6 silver dimes a couple weeks back & tried some areas I hadn't covered that day. Started the day off slow but ended up turning out pretty good. I ended up with 5 silver dimes this time ('18s, '19, '26 Mercs & '52 & '53d Roosevelts). Also managed 3 Indian Heads (1883, 1900, & 1901) and just 7 wheats. Just like last time nothing was all that deep, just had to contend with quite a few rusty nails in several spots & also the other annoying thing was short pieces of copper wire. It seemed like I dug up 50 pieces or more hoping to score an older wheat or an Indian. I got lucky late in the hunt when I was searching right up next to the old sidewalk in the front of the park. I found two of the Mercs & they weren't hardly 2" deep. Also found one of the Rosies near the sidewalk & it was pretty shallow too. I don't know how these were missed before. Called it a day about 3 in the afternoon as I had been there since 8 & it was pretty humid that day.
Sunday the 14th I went over to my friend Roger's place & we left from his house with the intent of trying a few older schools I had in mind. We arrived at the first one (a Jr. High) & tried the field in back but only stayed 30 min or so. The field was the old tan clay dirt & all I could find was surface clad. It had probably had fill brought in & regraded at some point. Kind of a bummer since I could tell parts of the school were older (40's era I would guess).
We then went just down the road to the high school & started hunting the schoolyard next to an older wing of the school. What was odd was that the first two coins I dug were the 1954 British 3 Pence coin & the 1965 50 Groschen coin from Austria. I was searching at the outer edge of the grass next to a banked concrete wall at the edge of the property. Later after a couple passes I got a good screaming high tone which turned out to be the '51 Washington only about 4-5" down. Followed that with a '54 Rosie only 2-3" deep, then a '52d Washington plus a wheat cent. After 2 1/2 to 3 hours we took a lunch break then got back at it. I tried the field further out beyond the school building wing in a more open area, but was getting more junk & the dirt seemed to have a lot more rocks in it making it hard to dig. I decided to go back to the area I started in but made the passes perpendicular from my earlier ones. Got a few more wheats & then had a good signal right were a plug was. Dug just off to the edge of it & pulled another '54 Roosevelt from about 4-5" down. Went around to the other side of the building where Roger was to see how he was doing. Told him that I had got another silver dime, but the bad news was, that it should have been "someone else's". Anyway we ended up down on the outer edges of the football/track field where I was searching over in a corner next to an old house the school uses to store some equipment, I guess. Hadn't found much but a few clad quarters & some memorials when I got another good high tone that was only 3-4" deep. I was surprised when it turned out to be a Standing Liberty (no date). It had been quite a while since I had found at least 3 silver quarters in one day.
Not long after that, I met up with Roger again who had been over at the other side of the field near some stands digging a bunch of clad & we decided to try another school I had in mind that is currently a public school but had been a Catholic school that I thought had been built in the 50's but I never could verify that. We spent a little over an hour there & found several coins but no wheats or silver like I had hoped. We were getting tired by then as it was getting late in the afternoon so we called it a day. I got pretty lucky with 5 silvers that day. Felt kind of bad for Roger as he didn't get any silvers & just missed getting one. He found a lot more coins that I did but they were all clad except for 2-3 wheats. Right now I am at 60 silver coins for this year & unless I hit a lengthy dry spell, I should end up finding more than last year. Last year I only managed 80 all year but that was still a significant improvement over the meager 52 I had in '07.
Sat. the 6th went to a school I had been to before & managed to find two Mercs ('17s & '24) along with 3 wheats. Also found some sort of pin from an old school rifle club I am guessing. Also found quite a bit of clad & a cheap looking kid's ring. After a few hours there I went a few miles over to another town's vacant lot along the main highway thru town. I had searched it a few years before & found mostly older clad but got lucky & found 3 Mercs together but that was the only silver found in the whole field then. This time I also found more older clad but did manage to get 5 wheats & luck into a '36 Merc. Left after about 3 1/2 hours or so. I was fighting a cold all day & didn't feel my best but it seemed tolerable.
Sat. night & into Sunday morning I didn't get much sleep & began to feel worse - more like the flu rather than a typical cold. Nevertheless I decided I was going to go out & try to hunt somewhere Sunday so I went to an old high school athletic field that had been productive for me since I started hunting in in 2006. It was pretty warm that day & the heat seemed to be bothering me more than usual due to being sick, even though I tried to stay in the shade somewhat. After a couple of hours & only getting a few clad coins I wondered over to a hillside where I hadn't found anything good before which has always frustrated me a little since it looks like a prime gathering spot & also since other flat areas nearby had been productive. I finally got a good signal near the bottom of the hill & pulled a '44d Merc from about 5-6". I then decided to call it quits as I was feeling pretty run down by then & didn't want to push myself any more. I ended up calling in sick to work Monday but did feel better enough to make it in Tuesday.
Sat. the 13th went back to the park where I found 6 silver dimes a couple weeks back & tried some areas I hadn't covered that day. Started the day off slow but ended up turning out pretty good. I ended up with 5 silver dimes this time ('18s, '19, '26 Mercs & '52 & '53d Roosevelts). Also managed 3 Indian Heads (1883, 1900, & 1901) and just 7 wheats. Just like last time nothing was all that deep, just had to contend with quite a few rusty nails in several spots & also the other annoying thing was short pieces of copper wire. It seemed like I dug up 50 pieces or more hoping to score an older wheat or an Indian. I got lucky late in the hunt when I was searching right up next to the old sidewalk in the front of the park. I found two of the Mercs & they weren't hardly 2" deep. Also found one of the Rosies near the sidewalk & it was pretty shallow too. I don't know how these were missed before. Called it a day about 3 in the afternoon as I had been there since 8 & it was pretty humid that day.
Sunday the 14th I went over to my friend Roger's place & we left from his house with the intent of trying a few older schools I had in mind. We arrived at the first one (a Jr. High) & tried the field in back but only stayed 30 min or so. The field was the old tan clay dirt & all I could find was surface clad. It had probably had fill brought in & regraded at some point. Kind of a bummer since I could tell parts of the school were older (40's era I would guess).
We then went just down the road to the high school & started hunting the schoolyard next to an older wing of the school. What was odd was that the first two coins I dug were the 1954 British 3 Pence coin & the 1965 50 Groschen coin from Austria. I was searching at the outer edge of the grass next to a banked concrete wall at the edge of the property. Later after a couple passes I got a good screaming high tone which turned out to be the '51 Washington only about 4-5" down. Followed that with a '54 Rosie only 2-3" deep, then a '52d Washington plus a wheat cent. After 2 1/2 to 3 hours we took a lunch break then got back at it. I tried the field further out beyond the school building wing in a more open area, but was getting more junk & the dirt seemed to have a lot more rocks in it making it hard to dig. I decided to go back to the area I started in but made the passes perpendicular from my earlier ones. Got a few more wheats & then had a good signal right were a plug was. Dug just off to the edge of it & pulled another '54 Roosevelt from about 4-5" down. Went around to the other side of the building where Roger was to see how he was doing. Told him that I had got another silver dime, but the bad news was, that it should have been "someone else's". Anyway we ended up down on the outer edges of the football/track field where I was searching over in a corner next to an old house the school uses to store some equipment, I guess. Hadn't found much but a few clad quarters & some memorials when I got another good high tone that was only 3-4" deep. I was surprised when it turned out to be a Standing Liberty (no date). It had been quite a while since I had found at least 3 silver quarters in one day.
Not long after that, I met up with Roger again who had been over at the other side of the field near some stands digging a bunch of clad & we decided to try another school I had in mind that is currently a public school but had been a Catholic school that I thought had been built in the 50's but I never could verify that. We spent a little over an hour there & found several coins but no wheats or silver like I had hoped. We were getting tired by then as it was getting late in the afternoon so we called it a day. I got pretty lucky with 5 silvers that day. Felt kind of bad for Roger as he didn't get any silvers & just missed getting one. He found a lot more coins that I did but they were all clad except for 2-3 wheats. Right now I am at 60 silver coins for this year & unless I hit a lengthy dry spell, I should end up finding more than last year. Last year I only managed 80 all year but that was still a significant improvement over the meager 52 I had in '07.