I've been working on researching new places to hunt. This is a daunting task, as time and time again I've spent time at the library, online, etc., researching an interesting old site, only to get there and find that it had effectively been cleaned out. When I bring these places up to the old timers at our club meetings afterwards, they jovially state "That place, oh yeah, we cleaned that out 20 years ago, it was great!". Virgin territory around here, aside from a park scrape or lot demo, is a rarity indeed.
This round of research led to abundant new (to me) information, as well as an old map showing some very interesting areas to detect. With map in hand, and permission to hunt these new sites, I called my friend Mark (aka BeachBumm) to hunt and off we went for the day to investigate them. The first spot we hit was almost void of targets, a few gratis clad coins and the usual trash, but it had obviously been hunted before. The second spot we hit was horribly grown over, it was difficult just to move around, let alone swing your coil, but it did yield a few wheatbacks, so we figured it had potential and might be worth another visit after we run out of areas to hunt at this location. The third spot started off odd. We were told to look for an old picnic area next to a salix tree. We found the tree, but it was very small , and the geography of the area didn't lend itself to being a picnic ground. We decided to detect it for a while anyhow, but after a bit concluded that it couldn't be the spot we were looking for. While we were discussing it, I spied a small flat area up a steep hill, and we decided to check it out. When we got to the top, it looked like we may have found the spot. Mark veered to the left and I to the right swinging away.
A few minutes later I get a nice big silver signal. Having no idea what was about to begin, I dug down and out pops a rather odd, hippie looking piece of jewelery. It's a BIG silver cut out pin that reads "I AM". I flipped it over and could make out that it was marked "sterling" , but couldn't really read the rest of the mark. Not really my cup of tea, but a big piece of silver is always welcome in my pouch. A few feet away from there I get a nickel'ish signal and a few inches down out pops a gold'ish flowerette looking object. Thinking it's junk, I stick it in my junk pocket and move on. A few feet from there is an old tree stump, so I decide to quickly scan around the base. Immediately I get a solid penny signal, and dig down a few inches and out pops a beautiful Art Deco silver/gold bracelet with amethyst stones! Wow, now I'm excited, but it hasn't quite sunk in what I've encountered. After I do the happy dance with the bracelet, I rescan the hole and only inches away I get a high silver'ish tone, inches away from where the bracelet was recovered I pull a pair of what appear to be silver cuff links out. Wow, what's going on here? I quickly scan around the tree trunk base a bit with my detector and it's lighting up targets like the 4th of July. I can't believe it, did I find my first cache? By this time, Mark comes down to see what's going on. I show him my finds and lay claim to the tree trunk perimeter
For the next two hours I dug signal after signal, for a total target count of 30 targets. Two targets were wheat pennies (1936 and 1942), two were keys, both stamped with the number "165", and two buttons in poor shape (not shown), but the rest was jewelery. The targets were spread out around this tree trunk within a ten foot radius, some targets were only a few inches under the tree droppings, yet others were as deep as 8". Typically I'd expect a coin or jewelery cache to be concentrated (buried in a container or sack that has degenerated) , unless it was in a plowed field where it could be spread around, but that's not the case here. What story do the two matching keys have to tell? Are they safe deposit box keys, strong box keys, Greyhound locker keys, or what? It's an interesting find with big mystic surrounding it. How did it end up here? When was it buried here? Why was it buried here? And why was it spread around and not in one hole? I'll probably never know the answers to this enigma.
OK, let's see some pictures
The piece that started it all (interestingly this piece was made by Leonore Doskow who's been a silversmith on the East Coast since the 1920's and her pins, necklaces and bracelets are collector
This round of research led to abundant new (to me) information, as well as an old map showing some very interesting areas to detect. With map in hand, and permission to hunt these new sites, I called my friend Mark (aka BeachBumm) to hunt and off we went for the day to investigate them. The first spot we hit was almost void of targets, a few gratis clad coins and the usual trash, but it had obviously been hunted before. The second spot we hit was horribly grown over, it was difficult just to move around, let alone swing your coil, but it did yield a few wheatbacks, so we figured it had potential and might be worth another visit after we run out of areas to hunt at this location. The third spot started off odd. We were told to look for an old picnic area next to a salix tree. We found the tree, but it was very small , and the geography of the area didn't lend itself to being a picnic ground. We decided to detect it for a while anyhow, but after a bit concluded that it couldn't be the spot we were looking for. While we were discussing it, I spied a small flat area up a steep hill, and we decided to check it out. When we got to the top, it looked like we may have found the spot. Mark veered to the left and I to the right swinging away.
A few minutes later I get a nice big silver signal. Having no idea what was about to begin, I dug down and out pops a rather odd, hippie looking piece of jewelery. It's a BIG silver cut out pin that reads "I AM". I flipped it over and could make out that it was marked "sterling" , but couldn't really read the rest of the mark. Not really my cup of tea, but a big piece of silver is always welcome in my pouch. A few feet away from there I get a nickel'ish signal and a few inches down out pops a gold'ish flowerette looking object. Thinking it's junk, I stick it in my junk pocket and move on. A few feet from there is an old tree stump, so I decide to quickly scan around the base. Immediately I get a solid penny signal, and dig down a few inches and out pops a beautiful Art Deco silver/gold bracelet with amethyst stones! Wow, now I'm excited, but it hasn't quite sunk in what I've encountered. After I do the happy dance with the bracelet, I rescan the hole and only inches away I get a high silver'ish tone, inches away from where the bracelet was recovered I pull a pair of what appear to be silver cuff links out. Wow, what's going on here? I quickly scan around the tree trunk base a bit with my detector and it's lighting up targets like the 4th of July. I can't believe it, did I find my first cache? By this time, Mark comes down to see what's going on. I show him my finds and lay claim to the tree trunk perimeter
For the next two hours I dug signal after signal, for a total target count of 30 targets. Two targets were wheat pennies (1936 and 1942), two were keys, both stamped with the number "165", and two buttons in poor shape (not shown), but the rest was jewelery. The targets were spread out around this tree trunk within a ten foot radius, some targets were only a few inches under the tree droppings, yet others were as deep as 8". Typically I'd expect a coin or jewelery cache to be concentrated (buried in a container or sack that has degenerated) , unless it was in a plowed field where it could be spread around, but that's not the case here. What story do the two matching keys have to tell? Are they safe deposit box keys, strong box keys, Greyhound locker keys, or what? It's an interesting find with big mystic surrounding it. How did it end up here? When was it buried here? Why was it buried here? And why was it spread around and not in one hole? I'll probably never know the answers to this enigma.
OK, let's see some pictures
The piece that started it all (interestingly this piece was made by Leonore Doskow who's been a silversmith on the East Coast since the 1920's and her pins, necklaces and bracelets are collector
