I like thinking about these things and hunting gold accordingly!...The Junk leads the way!
Ya see, from about the 40's on, gold was about $35/oz. Everybody got married back then and ALL the wedding rings were GOLD, also, ALL the class rings were GOLD! Pretty much all jewelry was fabricated from a PM of some sort, either AU or AG, with a few costume pieces here and there...
Plus, folks recreated outside a whole lot more than they do today, there were Summer outdoor sports leagues of all sorts, not to mention Companies had employee BaseBall teams and whatnot...There was just nothing to do in the house, and with only 3 channels available on the TV, a guy may as well go outside and play some BB or something...
Well, when a guy hits some park dirt or curbstrips throwing off some 60's era tabs, various little bits and items that pre-date the 70's, Boy Scout slides and buttons, old brand crimped bottle tops etc, that where a guy is keying in on the GOLD tones! Thats Prime Pay Dirt for the Gold wearing years!
Back then, in the 60's, if you lost a gold ring in the BB field, there was no such thing as a 'Ringfinder' to dial up on your cell phone for help...Metal detectors were just coming out and not as common (or accurate) as they are today...So that Pre-70's dirt is the key to finding gold, and the junk will tell you if you are in it!
Nowadays nobody is getting married let alone buying a gold ring! Nobody is spending any amount of time out of doors, nobody is playing on a Company BaseBall league or even carrying any kind of metallic money let alone wearing any Gold Jewelry. Then, you add in the 'Ringfinders' and cell phones and every totter is swept twice/week by all the swinging sticks out there...
Plus, Theres all these bastard metals nowadays for jewelry!....Lustrium, Tungsten, Titanium, SS, Cobalt, being marketed to an ignorant generation who has no appreciation of the timeless value of AU or AG...
So I agree, with all of these post 70's considerations, fresh drop Gold is very hard to find...
Yeah, theres dirt gold out there, water gold too, lost long ago, and the junk will tell you if you are hunting in the right time zone..
FWIW, you take a look at an old guys ringfinger gold wedding band...its been on there 40+ years and pretty much grown into the skin like a piece of wire around a fenceline tree...that thing aint coming off without a fight and pair of sidecutters!...All Morticians will agree, they get all the easy old gold! .."Clip his finger off at the knuckle Charley, thats at least a 6 grammer there!"
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