Another forgotten town...*Updated 4/23*

Day 3, Monday finds

I also got out to the old town site yesterday (Monday), but again I only had about 2 hours to hunt in the afternoon - dang work took up all my time in the morning For this hunt, I decided to try my smaller 5x8 coil - on the first two days, I was using a larger NEL Thunder coil, and I was finding it to be almost impossible to get a good ground balance. It was also just too darned difficult to get good separation and isolate individual targets with a big coil - there's just too much going on in this field and I've got too little experience with the new machine to for me to adequately decipher what I was hearing. For me, the difference was immense - the machine was MUCH quieter and easy to ground balance properly with the smaller coil. It was well worth the trade off in coverage versus the large coil to have the quiet and better separation. And since most of the finds have been coming up in the 2-4" range, with only a couple out of the 6" range, I'm not real concerned about any loss of depth with the small coil.

Just like Day 1, I was thrilled to have my very first signal on firing up the detector turn out to be a solid 71-72 screamer - IHP at less than two inches! I felt like that was great affirmation that my coil decision was a good one!

I also learned a lesson on discrimination - with the bigger coil, I ended up running my discrim up to 44 (maximum on the Max) to help quiet things down. With the smaller coil, I was able to comfortably lower the discrim down to 34, and still keep pretty quiet operation. Well, not long into the hunt, I got the coil over a dead solid 41 signal (for reference, nickels are around 51 on the AT series). I dug, and out pops the bent fork with some neat Victorian scrolling on the handle! Unfortuately it isn't sterling - the back is stamped "silver plated", but still a pretty cool personal item from some former resident! Anyway, it wasn't lost on me that if I had been hunting like the previous days with the discrim up, I would have completely missed a cool target - I was also left wondering how many neat targets I've missed over the last two hunts

I ended up with two more Inidans, 1890 and 1904, plus a couple more old shotshell headstamps from the same time frame. It's pretty cool - between the headstamps and the coins, we should be able to start getting a solid idea of when the town was active. So far, the most recent coins have been 1904 (Dan had an '04 Indian, too). The headstamps aren't dating any later than that either, so far.

The square top copper roof fasteners were the bane of my existence - they rang up identical to Indians, so they got my heart racing each time I got over one! They were all coming from the same general spot, and I couldn't not dig them - they sounded too dang good! Plus the 1904 Indian came out from among that same area, so I had to keep digging

I ended up digging more .22 cartridges than I really wanted, too! Between the roof fasteners and the .22 cartridges, it was like the late 19th century version of pull tabs!! But I'll take the fasteners and cartridges any day

The white knob was an interesting find - it screamed "silver dime", solid 81 or 82. It's the ceramic knob from the old knob-and-tube wiring used from about the 1880s through the early 1900s, and I'm guessing the nail used to fasten it to the studs or joists is still inside - and apparently it must be a copper nail judging by the signal?? Anyway, I thought it was cool, because it confirms the town used electricity and probably had at least some electric lights.

Again, it was an extremely fun couple hours!

Quick hunt tonight

The weather was absolutely gorgeous this evening, so I managed to sneak out and get a few swings in at the site again. I've forgotten what it was like to hunt in short sleeves!! I felt like the arm cuff was way too big because I'm so used to having 4 thick layers plus a coat bulking up my arm for all my hunts since November!

I arrived at the site only about 15 or 20 minutes before sunset, and I kept hunting until it got dark and the coyote yelps started to creep me out too much This was the first time I did any sort of hunting at night also - definitely a different experience!

Still no silver, but I did score another Indian Head - this one was 1906, the most recent coin so far from the site. So it looks like the town was active at least from 1892 (when it was platted) to 1906. And with this find, I actually have more Indian Heads for the year than Wheat cents, thanks entirely to this site! Wouldn’t it be great to be able to keep that trend going??

Other than the Indian, just an old headstamp, part of a harmonica reed...and a bunch of those darned Indian Head mimicing roof fasteners again! The porcelain button and the brass/copper pipe valve were both eyeball surface finds.

AirmetTango said:

The weather was absolutely gorgeous this evening, so I managed to sneak out and get a few swings in at the site again. I've forgotten what it was like to hunt in short sleeves!! I felt like the arm cuff was way too big because I'm so used to having 4 thick layers plus a coat bulking up my arm for all my hunts since November!

I arrived at the site only about 15 or 20 minutes before sunset, and I kept hunting until it got dark and the coyote yelps started to creep me out too much This was the first time I did any sort of hunting at night also - definitely a different experience!

Still no silver, but I did score another Indian Head - this one was 1906, the most recent coin so far from the site. So it looks like the town was active at least from 1892 (when it was platted) to 1906. And with this find, I actually have more Indian Heads for the year than Wheat cents, thanks entirely to this site! Wouldn’t it be great to be able to keep that trend going??

Other than the Indian, just an old headstamp, part of a harmonica reed...and a bunch of those darned Indian Head mimicing roof fasteners again! The porcelain button and the brass/copper pipe valve were both eyeball surface finds.

Click to expand...

Yes it was a very nice day outside. Glad to see that you made it out again. I like the color on that Indian head penny and glad to see that you found yourself a porcelain button. Hopefully you are getting more comfortable with the AT Max.

Not too much longer and the farmers will plant the fields.

Dan B. said:

Yes it was a very nice day outside. Glad to see that you made it out again. I like the color on that Indian head penny and glad to see that you found yourself a porcelain button. Hopefully you are getting more comfortable with the AT Max.

Not too much longer and the farmers will plant the fields.

Click to expand...

Yep, I am making some good, positive progress with the Max. I'm starting to understand the changes I have to make to the setup to suit each individual site's conditions.

I got out to the site again on Friday thinking it might be the last time before crops go in, but with the deluge of rain we had over the weekend it'll be awhile before the fields dry out - might've bought some extra time!

For those still following the thread, I visited the field again on Friday, this time armed with a smaller coil. I ended up getting over more relics than anything else this time. The coolest, I think, is the ornament with the lady's head in the center - no idea what it went to, but it has two small holes in the base that clearly once helped mount it on something. Lots of other Victorian themed bits of copper or brass, including a rosette with some intricate engraving and what might be a carriage handle. The jeweled decoration (maybe from a jewelry box?) was a heart stopper for a few seconds before I came back to reality and realized there was no way those were diamonds I also found what appears to be a small, gold colored, flat button with the shank broken off the back - it was a solid hit from about 6" down.

The object near the top that looks like a nail with a broad head in the first pic is interesting - I assumed it was just that, a broken nail. But for who knows what reason, I decided to clean it and I was to see some lettering start to appear. I eventually was able to get "Scovill Mfg Co" to show pretty clearly - a Scovill fastener of some kind

And I ended up with another ball bearing/milling ball - this one even bigger than the last one at about 1.5" diameter! Dang these things sounded fabulous on the machine - I felt absolutely positive big silver, or at least a large cent was coming out of the holes! I added a pic of the two together to show the size difference. I guess I gotta have brass ball to detect this site...

I knew I was jinxing myself when I mentioned having more Indians for the year than Wheats thanks to this site - the first coin out of the ground on this hunt was the 1914 Wheat. I've admittedly gotten spoiled by digging all the Indians here - I felt a tinge of disappointment that it was "just" a Wheat I quickly reminded myself that I had just dug a coin that was over 100 years old! And the find expands the date range of potential habitation for the town by almost another decade.

Later in the hunt, I moved to a different section of the town and the last two coins suddenly got a lot more recent - a 1951 Wheat and a 1974 Memorial that was in such toasty shape that I initially thought it was a Zincoln. The lock and key came from the same section.

Anyway, I'm hoping to get back out there a time or two before the farmer plants - I'm determined to find some silver!! I'm a little surprised I haven't turned up any nickels yet, either...gotta keep diggin!

Glad to see that you made it out again and that you are getting the hang of your AT Max. Before long you should be through the learning curve and then when I upgrade you can be my instructor . Nice looking bunch of relics keep swinging there has to be silver somewhere.

But the weather forecast that I have seen you should be able to make it out one or two more times take care good luck.

Very interesting. Nice knowing you've got your own little chest of secrets there and can pop on over to get some fun finds. A lot different than chasing the tides on the beach and only getting a few hours before Mother covers everything back up with sand again.

Nice finds. I would be going back there. Good Luck and Happy Hunting!

Been out to this site several more times, and still having a blast! For now, I’m just updating for the coins I found since the last post - there are way too many relics to even count at this point!

Got my first silver out of the site on Friday, an 1861 Seated Liberty dime, along with a 1904 Indian. I posted more detail about the hunt in this thread.

I went back out on Saturday evening and hunted past dark. I started out with a 1904 V nickel in lovely shape, followed by a Wheatie that looked too toasty to get a date when I was looking at it in the field. Clean up at home shows it to be either 1920 or 1929. The star of the evening showed up after dark though - a 1913 Barber dime become silver #2 for the site, found just a few steps away from where I got then Seated dime the previous day. I was thoroughly convinced I had another silver, but the site was just pranking me - more on that funny story here!

Sunday was a very short hunt, but produced an 1892 Indian and nailed a third silver, a 1942 Merc - the rim looked beautiful in the plug, but when I rinsed it at home it turned out to be the most oxidized silver I’ve found yet, at least on the front. The back doesn’t look too bad.

Today’s hunt was quite subdued as far as digging coins at the site - in fact I didn’t dig any! But I did find an awesome Buff - spotted it as I was walking back to my car with my TreasureTracker Mark 1 Eyeballs, sitting right on top of the ground. The pic below shows it exactly as I found it, gorgeous green patina and all! The back is equally green!

That’s what I’ve got so far for the coins - 3 Wheats, 9 Indians, 1 Merc, 1 Barber dime, 1 Seated dime, 1 Buff, 1 V, and even a dang Lincoln Memorial. Hoping to put together a post to highlight the most interesting relics for the hunt soon, too.

Thanks for looking!