A
Anonymous
Guest
I headed out early today, and went to the same park I've been working the past couple weeks, but this time went to an area known to give up old coins. It's trashy, but not terribly so. Most of the older stuff is between 4 and 6" down.
I got a rather ragged-sounding target, nice and high on my CZ, at an indicated 4". It sounded odd, like it was bigger than it ought to be for some reason. I opened a plug, scanned, and the target's in the hole. I scooped out the loose dirt, scanned that, nothing. I pulled out my Vibraprobe, and started scanning with that. Lo and behold! 5 o'clock in the wall of the hole! I flipped out a divot of dirt and saw a penny laying there. I picked it up, and saw it was a Wheat. I pocketed it, and noticed there was another coin right next to where the first one was. I picked it up, and noticed it was really, really crusty and corroded. But, it wasn't the crusty green verdigris that one normally associates with pennies. This was a blackish-colored corrosion with a few red highlights. I grinned, as I knew immediately what I had. I scanned the hole, and there's still coins in there! I came up with three Wheat's, plus the crusty thing. I ended up picking up two more Wheat's before I left. They're dated '48D, '51D, '52D, and two '53D's.
I got home, and gave the crusty thing a little soak in my electrolysis tank. Here's what I could make out on the back side:
<center> <img src=http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/3347/20050701steelwheat2gy.jpg> </center> <p>
Yup! It's a '43 Steelie! My second one! The obverse is toast, and I can just barely make out the outline of Lincoln's bust, but I guess the first Wheat I picked up was laying back-to-back with the Steelie, as I can make out the words "ONE CENT" and part of "United States of America".
On my way home, I stopped at a school I've been working here-and-there. I found a little area, on a practice field, that started turning up quite a few coins. Last target of the day, as the light was failing, was this:
<center> <img src=http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/1688/20050701crucifix2jc.jpg> </center> <p>
A Sterling crucifix. Hey, I'll take it! I looked for the chain, but couldn't find it.
Note: the picture(s) might not show up due to bandwidth limitations. If the picture(s) are not there, check back at a later time.
HH from Allen in MI
I got a rather ragged-sounding target, nice and high on my CZ, at an indicated 4". It sounded odd, like it was bigger than it ought to be for some reason. I opened a plug, scanned, and the target's in the hole. I scooped out the loose dirt, scanned that, nothing. I pulled out my Vibraprobe, and started scanning with that. Lo and behold! 5 o'clock in the wall of the hole! I flipped out a divot of dirt and saw a penny laying there. I picked it up, and saw it was a Wheat. I pocketed it, and noticed there was another coin right next to where the first one was. I picked it up, and noticed it was really, really crusty and corroded. But, it wasn't the crusty green verdigris that one normally associates with pennies. This was a blackish-colored corrosion with a few red highlights. I grinned, as I knew immediately what I had. I scanned the hole, and there's still coins in there! I came up with three Wheat's, plus the crusty thing. I ended up picking up two more Wheat's before I left. They're dated '48D, '51D, '52D, and two '53D's.
I got home, and gave the crusty thing a little soak in my electrolysis tank. Here's what I could make out on the back side:
<center> <img src=http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/3347/20050701steelwheat2gy.jpg> </center> <p>
Yup! It's a '43 Steelie! My second one! The obverse is toast, and I can just barely make out the outline of Lincoln's bust, but I guess the first Wheat I picked up was laying back-to-back with the Steelie, as I can make out the words "ONE CENT" and part of "United States of America".
On my way home, I stopped at a school I've been working here-and-there. I found a little area, on a practice field, that started turning up quite a few coins. Last target of the day, as the light was failing, was this:
<center> <img src=http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/1688/20050701crucifix2jc.jpg> </center> <p>
A Sterling crucifix. Hey, I'll take it! I looked for the chain, but couldn't find it.
Note: the picture(s) might not show up due to bandwidth limitations. If the picture(s) are not there, check back at a later time.
HH from Allen in MI