Big Boys Hobbies

For Whom The Bell Tolls!!!! & Silver #20 FTY

JNimons

JNimons

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Location
Beacon Falls, CT
Wow...what can I say.....first hole of the day!!! Scratch off a major bucket lister.....Crotal Bell. I was actually shaking. Been wanting one for a long time! After taking pictures, etc. About to fill the hole, and I run my Sunray probe across the bottom....Still screaming.....NO WAY!!! Gently start digging, pull out a rivet with leather attached. Probe in the hole again....Still screaming. Unearth 2 more bells. All in all ended up with a 5 crotal bell spill. Must have been a complete harness dropped.

Question for those of you familiar with crotals. Are crotals Tombac? These sure look like Tombac the way they came out of the ground.

Glad the day started off so well, because it was pretty much downhill from there.

Dug a '57 Rosie, and a 1911 Wheat, along with some odds and ends, and a Silver Plated Spoon, with a backmark that says Stratford Silver Company.

Puts me at 20 Silver, and 34 wheats for the year.

Thanks for looking, and I apologize once again for the amount of pictures.





That bell was down there!!!



Crotals # 2 and #3...



I didn't get pictures of the last 2 as the land owners daughter was watching the extraction. Last 2 were DEEP!



My fingers are at ground level of the hole. The blade is 7"...














 
Last edited:
Wow! A frontal bell spill doesn't come up very often. Nice!


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Congrats on the pile of bells! Are the balls still in them, do they still dingaling? :lol: Some that I found still have them and some rusted away. Great find!!
 
Semtav said:
Thats quite a find there. And pretty deep too !!
Click to expand...

X-Terra70 said:
Congrats on the coins and the bells! :D
Click to expand...

jwp1964 said:
Wow! A frontal bell spill doesn't come up very often. Nice!


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Click to expand...

remmy said:
Congrats on the pile of bells! Are the balls still in them, do they still dingaling? :lol: Some that I found still have them and some rusted away. Great find!!
Click to expand...

Thank you everyone. 4 out of the 5 bells had functioning ding-a-lings!
 
Apparently I missed this 5 years ago :lol: that's alot of bells, and I agree it was probably close to a complete harness when dropped. You can actually shine those back up and make Christmas decorations with them. Think I saw that on here somewhere :yes: keep me posted on a hunt, congrats man!
 
Thanks for resurrecting the thread, I hadn't seen it before. Those are some great finds. It's amazing to me that you found five bells in the same hole and they aren't broken, because from what I understand the bronze or brass they are made of is usually quite brittle. My guess would be that the larger ones are more prone to breaking when stepped on. The smaller ones might have a higher survival rate. I found a bell fragment back in January, and hope to find a complete one some day.
 
Dang John you dug more Crotal's in one hole than I have dug in 13 years. Teamed with that Silver Rosie I'd say you had a pretty successful day. Congrats on them and all the rest. Trapper
 
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