Big Boys Hobbies

Are the glory days just story's now?

40acre1870

40acre1870

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I was at a euchre tournament not too long ago and the talk of metal detecting came up. Two older gentleman in their 70's said that they would hunt our area back in the 70's & 80's and found enough silver coins, that you could cover the card table, stacked 30 high.

Is there anyone who has been in the hobby that long that can say the same thing. I am guessing that it was much easier back in the day, access to properties and such. Society as a whole seems a bit more cautious these days. I would also guess that you wouldn't have to be very skilled in the arts of detecting in the 70's either. It is a whole new ballgame now.

Side note:

I have been working in Mexico for the past year and I have come to the conclusion that Mexico is about 30 years behind the US, when it comes to their attitude and lifestyle. Kids, ages five and six, walk to the store by themselves, kids standing up in the front seats of cars, nobody seatbelted in. People having party's at their house with loud music, and none of the neighbors care. I actually enjoy living in Mexico. Life is much more simpler down here.
 
Wouldn't surprise me one bit.... just think, silver coins back then were 40 years newer than they are now... that much shallower and that much more common. In 1970 they were just 6 years out of production...

I wonder in the late 60s what the percentage of dimes and quarters in normal circulation were pre-65. Did most people immediately sort through all their change and pull out the silver, or just keep on rolling like nothing ever changed? Didn't the government ask for people to turn it all in? I just did a little reading and it sounds like people were smart and hoarded them. I read there was a big shortage of quarters and dimes in 1965 and 1966. Actually, part of the reason for the switch was that people were already hoarding and melting their quarters and dimes for profit before the clad switch in 1965.

Still there had to be loads more silver in people's pockets in 1970 than there is in 2013, so it makes sense that there was way more in the ground then. Plus not to mention 40 years worth of silver getting picked up but not dropped.
 
I can't imagine hitting virgin spots when metal detecting was just becoming a hobby. Can you imagine hitting an old fairgrounds or park where nobody had detected before??? No wonder they talk about leaving with both pockets full of silver coins! My mom worked at a little grocery store in 1972 I believe when she was in high school and has ALOT of silver coins that her and my grandma traded out. Seems to me that quite a few people were still spending and carrying silver in the early seventies without thinking twice about it.
 
I was detecting in 1975 and yes, the atmosphere WAS a lot less tense then.

We detectorists had not gotten the bum rap and bum's rush we often get today. Findings were easier then, in public areas like parks, BUT that does NOT mean that the Earth is picked clean today! Detectorists were, have been and still are a minority hobby.

Unless you go to a spot specifically attractive to detecotrists, how many people do YOU see out MDing at any given time? So while the pickings were easier in the Seventies, the number of swingers was correspondingly low.

It was easier getting permission. Fewer people called the cops on us. But that is, I think, a function of 9/11. Thee is a collective psychological effect of 9/11 that I call "The Hunch". Not 'hunch' as in "I've got a hunch that so and so....." but rather a clenched, drawn in feeling.

I've noticed it in artistic memes. For instance, look at automobiles. In the Seventies they were boxy, square, a reaction against fins of the Sixties. Then their lines softened, they became roundre, more 'feminine' looking. Then they began looking somewhat like athletic shoes looked. After 9/11 thouth the look changed dramatically. Look at the next car you see in front of you. Chances are the back end will be *high* with a smaller back window. It looks like a bullet shield doesn't it? Cars are taller, higher up from the ground and there is a puffy, armored look to them. They look a LOT like... a rolling, clenched fist! Hunched up, drawn in, elevated, back end hunched up in defensive mode. Defensive aggressive presence.

That "Hunch" is a mindset as well. It comes into play when someone sees someone *else* swinging a coil. Instead of "H'm, wonder what he's doing. Maybe I'll ask." it becomes "What's that? Is he a terrorist? I'd better call the cops!"

TSA is not a solution to our nation's problems, it's a *symptom* of them. We NEED to relax! To start to trust again. We can't return to the seventies but we CAN try to understand that our hunched clenched defensive posturing is only hurting ourselves.

Just my $0.02

SageGrouse
"We have met the enemy and he is us!" -- Pogo Possum
 
SageGrouse, you've hit the nail on the head my friend. Well said.....

I started MD when I was young, and no one bothered to ask me what I was doing. I carried my MD everywhere I went, and pulled piles of silver out of the ground. Back then though silver was just like clad these days. Most of it was traded in on candy and soda, or a trip to the movies with popcorn and an ice cold drink.

Now a days silver is rare, and worth more than face value. Not to mention there are more of us out there, trying to get rich (lol).

There is virgin ground out there I believe. One just need to do some research to find it.
 
well said SageGrouse---I took me awhile before i didnt care if ppl saw me Mding-or to ask to hunt private land--
for the simple fact--"I" didnt trust people (wonder why)--->
In all my days partying in parks- campgrounds-drinking--loud music --etc-never had the cops called on me -- just last year alone mding--cops were called 3 times--twice"because it looked like i was digging holes"--And once cuz--thought i was burying something:laughing:!!with a 8"probe and a srewdriver??If i was there doing something illegal--i wld NOT be wearing a headlamp dressed in blaze orange and swing a machine 4 ft long that beeps --with my car parked "Rockstar"--!!!

--Just one time i would love to just hit a early 1900's public spot that closed and hasnt had a coin dropped since 1964:yes:!!!
 
Well, it's the year 2230 and the MD's are now 3D with a depth of 30 feet and can tell you the year, weight, and value of each target. Anything left?? btw, if you are reading this in the year 2230, say what you want about me - I won't care a bit!!!
 
Yes, I can remember being out MD early 70's with my father picking silver right off the top of the ground! Man I miss those days but, I have to admit it is still the same amount of fun today!
 
schill13 said:
Yes, I can remember being out MD early 70's with my father picking silver right off the top of the ground! Man I miss those days but, I have to admit it is still the same amount of fun today!
Click to expand...

I agree with you there. I have found more excitement from this hobby, than any other I have done.
 
SageGrouse said:
Unless you go to a spot specifically attractive to detecotrists, how many people do YOU see out MDing at any given time? So while the pickings were easier in the Seventies, the number of swingers was correspondingly low.
Click to expand...

Good point. I'm days away from 40 years old and I don't think I have EVER seen someone out metal detecting. I don't live near a beach and have not been fortunate enough to travel a lot.
 
Good old days gone.

Its far and few between now. Its out there but even the old guys will tell you. You have to have private ground or yards that haven't been hit. Several guys in our club have display cases stacked with silver. But it's like you say. from the good old days
 
I'm 36 and during the mid-late 90's I used to hunt arrowheads all the time. We went everywhere and never had trespassing or getting arrested cross our minds because I lived in a rural area and nobody cared. A few kids in the field...so what.

Now everything is gated, posted, private, etc.

Litigation is a big factor in my opinion. The fact that someone can trespass on YOUR property, hurt themselves, and sue YOU is part of the problem with this country. Prople are gun-shy and put up posted signs and lock the gate because of it.
 
Your answer is in the old treasure magazines. In the 1960s the cover stories were about someone finding 10s of thousands of coins in their first year. Silver coins weren't even mentioned because they were just common coins.

in the 1970s, the cover stories were about people finding thousands of old coins and now they start talking about the older 1900's silver coins.

in the 1980s, the stories become about finding silver coins, and other articles are about how to work those heavily hunted parks to pull missed silver coins.

So yes, I believe the story the old man told was very possible.
 
i wasnt hunting in the 70's or the 80's but i would think it would have been great hunting, albeit the machines disc stank, foil was everywhere. i think we can compare using the PI technology today to hunt the cw sites that have been pounded for decades w/ vlf's to the 70's and 80's. when you go over the pounded cw sites w/ the PI's it is like virgin ground. really makes me wish i had began the hobby when i was younger.
 
I'll be 70 this October. Started hunting in mid 60's when my wife to be introduced me to her grandfather who at the time was using a surplus army mine detector in his back yard. It was 'game on' as they used to say from that moment. There was a question posted on another forum asking 'how long did it take to find your first silver coin' My response was '8 seconds'. Got a Metrotec (Fisher Labs) soon after the bug hit, took outside, tuned it. First sweep to the left 'BEEP', a quarter. After that I measured my coin finds in 3lb coffee cans. These were culls of course. Some of you may remember in the early 70's when the Hunt brothers tried to corner the silver market. Silver ultimately hit $55 an ounce. But I wanted to buy a house and didn't have the money. You could buy I nice ranch then for around 20 grand. You could by a brand new chevy or ford for $2200. There where silver buyers set up everywhere, in the malls in large department stores, everywhere. It was crazy. So when silver hit $50 I took 6 coffee cans one at a time of my 'culls'. I had more than the down payment and paid cash for a new ford galaxy 500. Those days are gone same as the old '49ers finding one ounce nuggets laying on top of the ground. Yet even today with research I still find places untouch or barely touched. There are still places to hunt, you just have to work a little harder at it.
 
foiler said:
I'll be 70 this October. Started hunting in mid 60's when my wife to be introduced me to her grandfather who at the time was using a surplus army mine detector in his back yard. It was 'game on' as they used to say from that moment. There was a question posted on another forum asking 'how long did it take to find your first silver coin' My response was '8 seconds'. Got a Metrotec (Fisher Labs) soon after the bug hit, took outside, tuned it. First sweep to the left 'BEEP', a quarter. After that I measured my coin finds in 3lb coffee cans. These were culls of course. Some of you may remember in the early 70's when the Hunt brothers tried to corner the silver market. Silver ultimately hit $55 an ounce. But I wanted to buy a house and didn't have the money. You could buy I nice ranch then for around 20 grand. You could by a brand new chevy or ford for $2200. There where silver buyers set up everywhere, in the malls in large department stores, everywhere. It was crazy. So when silver hit $50 I took 6 coffee cans one at a time of my 'culls'. I had more than the down payment and paid cash for a new ford galaxy 500. Those days are gone same as the old '49ers finding one ounce nuggets laying on top of the ground. Yet even today with research I still find places untouch or barely touched. There are still places to hunt, you just have to work a little harder at it.
Click to expand...

Exactly what I was wondering. Great post foiler. Man I wish I would have started hunting a long time ago.

Thanks for the reply!
 
gordonquixote said:
I'm 36 and during the mid-late 90's I used to hunt arrowheads all the time. We went everywhere and never had trespassing or getting arrested cross our minds because I lived in a rural area and nobody cared. A few kids in the field...so what.

Now everything is gated, posted, private, etc.

Litigation is a big factor in my opinion. The fact that someone can trespass on YOUR property, hurt themselves, and sue YOU is part of the problem with this country. Prople are gun-shy and put up posted signs and lock the gate because of it.
Click to expand...

I agree 100%! Everyone is afraid of getting sued for no fault of their own.:no:
 
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