Found someone's science project: a tug-of-war between joy and disappointment
Warning: this is story time.
I wasn't going to post my finds from last weekend. Up until today I'd been pretty disgusted by what I'd found. I'm going to share the story of my find that caused a serious back-and-forth between excitement and let-down, over and over, as I tried to determine whether I had found a piece of both intrinsic and extrinsic value, or evidence of shameful activity which had been hidden by a guilty culprit.
This all started when I wasn't able to detect at my usual spot. At least, not really. Normally I dig at the site of an old coal mining community, which has yielded some fun artifacts from the 1890s to 1910s. Unfortunately, due to the full swing of agriculture at this point of the year, I was only able to detect in a tiny percentage of the land area, none of which falls in the "prime spots" I have on my list from historical research. I decided to go out anyway and give it a shot. It was about 80 degrees with dump water on your face humidity levels. I was still in the process of walking to the site when all of a sudden I realized that the right half of my upper lip, mouth, and nose area were completely numb and swollen to twice the normal size. In my confusion I started looking at the rest of my body and noticed that I had at least half a dozen welts the size of a quarter, and it became clear immediately what had happened: I'm horribly allergic to mosquito bites, and they love, love, love me. I returned to base camp to get some insect repellent, and even though I felt like puking, I went out to find some treasure.
Four hours of hunting later it was 9AM, the heat had cranked, the mosquitoes had laughed their way through the repellent, and all I had to show for my troubles were two freezer bags full of rusty junk, and part of the frame from the movement of a late 1890s wall clock. The latter might excite some people, but that stupid clock is the bane of my existence. Over the last year, I have perpetually dug more and more pieces of that clock over the spread of about 5 acres of land, each time thinking it will be something better than a brass gear. Pretty soon I'm going to be able to rebuild that blasted thing.
Realizing that this was a hopeless endeavor, I sent a text to someone asking permission to detect an old barn on his property. I knew it was falling down and full of decades-old manure, but I figured I'd give it a shot for a few minutes. Well, the owner replied and told me to go on ahead. He also said, "try the south end.. I just have a feeling, can't explain it."
I got there at about 4PM, and after meeting the family dog and setting some ground rules, I walked in the south door of the barn.
When I got in, it was seriously like being on another planet. I don't know what has transpired in the 20 or so years since I had last seen the inside of that barn, but there were these tunnels the size of basket balls that dipped in an out of the dirt floor everywhere. It looked like I was walking on a giant slice of Swiss cheese. There was some kind of mammalian skull sitting in the loose, dry dirt, and there were at least a dozen swallows protesting my presence by swooping around me and making hideous noises. There was about 10 square feet of room to walk amongst the holes and junk piled in there. I almost noped out immediately. But I decided to turn on the detector and just see what would happen. It was weird, because I turned it on, made a single sweep, and got a hit. I checked to make sure I wasn't set to "all metal" or something.. Nope, tone mode set to hyperspace, sensitivity set to low. I double checked to make sure there really was something there, and there was. The dirt was weird -- it was very, very dry and crumbly, almost like little pellets. I didn't even need my shovel, I just grasped at the dirt and felt something in my hand. Lo and behold, after three steps into the barn and detecting for less than ten seconds, I found this this in my hand:
I almost never find anything actually good, and certainly not the second I turn on my detector. Further, the sheer ridiculousness of having had the property owner tell me to "try the south end, I just have a feeling", followed by me finding silver immediately.. I dialed up the homeowner from the barn and asked, "did you salt me?"
"What?" he asked.
"You're not going to believe this."
He came outside, and after a quick rinse and a look through a loupe, we confirmed that I had found a Walking Liberty half-dollar. I expected him to claim it, but he said "it's all yours. Let me know if you find anything else."
I spent the next two hours scouring that barn, digging through old horse manure. While I did find a couple more things, the silver was the best. Or so I had thought.
Back in the light at basecamp, I noticed something weird. The coin had a weird shine to the surface, almost like it was coated in wax. Lightly rubbing it on anything made it worse.
The features of the coin were hardly noticeable. I wanted to get to the bottom of this, but I had to get back to my own house to do any serious cleaning. To be honest, I knew that the coin was in no condition to have numismatic value, so I figured I had nothing to lose by cleaning it. I found a thread on treasurenet about a technique for cleaning old silver, in which a bowl is lined with foil, the coin is placed inside with some baking soda, and boiling water is poured in for five minutes. I tested this on two other silver coins first, and after good results, I took some last pictures of the half-dollar in case I somehow toasted it.
No matter what I did, I couldn't with certainty lift a date. The crayon-like surface had only gotten worse.
I started the cleaning process. But after three run-throughs with boiling water and baking soda, literally nothing was changing. I kept at it. For an hour and a half. All of a sudden, after taking it out after a late run, the coin had turned a bizarre tan/green color from its former dark maroon.
It was legitimately starting to look worse than when I had started. I started to get concerned.
Later I noticed.. something was flaking off. I could move the surface of the coin by pushing with the back of my fingernail. Or soft plastic. Or anything.
Then I looked through a magnifying glass and noticed that the coin basically didn't have any reeding whatsoever. I started to realize this coin might not be real. I put it on a scale and it registered at 11.25 grams... I knew it could just be that it was worn, but all of the factors adding up.. no reeding, no detail, can be deformed by light pressure.. I knew the people who owned that property when this coin would have been minted. Could they have have counterfeited a half-dollar? It only made matters worse when further cleaning led to the sudden development of a bizarre oxidation layer:
Bewildered, I scratched at the piece with my fingernail and saw tiny piece of metal flaking away with each scratch!
I was pretty upset, so I took some actual polish to it, and noted that even after I had gotten it nice and shiny, it didn't ring at all like silver. It just made a dull "thud". I spent the rest of the evening clawing at the stupid thing, wondering why these people I knew had been so idiotic to have made a backyard fake silver coin. I was legitimately furious at the idea, and after much handling the coin had turned my hands dark grey like after you hand-sharpen an old pencil, I tossed the coin on a shelf, washed my hands, and went to bed.
A week later, I picked it up again. And I noticed two things. First, whereas there had been basically no reeding on the edges of the coin before, suddenly I noticed that there were quite visible reeds. I scratched at them a bit in disbelief. The more I did, the more reeds I saw. And I scratched and scratched at various areas until flakes and splinters stopped coming off. Suddenly, the coin didn't have the strange reflection on the surface it did before. And when I smelled my hands, they reeked of old onions -- exactly the way all silver smells in very short order if it sits out in the open in my house. I went and compared the smell to a sterling ring on the shelf nearby, and, as ridiculous as it sounds, the smell test clinched it for me.. it really is a silver half-dollar. And sure, it's worn pretty badly and you still can't read the date. But it isn't made of lead, or pewter, or whatever the hell I had in my hands in the first place. I tossed it on the scale again to find that I had scratched off just over 100 milligrams of metallic coating from the coin. I gave it a flick, and it had the gratifying, long-lasting "pringgggg" of coin silver. No more thuds. Satisfied that it could no longer be easily scratched by plastic cups or fingernails, I pieced together what had happened.
![IMG_1260[1].JPG](https://www.treasurenet.com/data/attachments/1110/1110291-021df8d07f2c67cb94ec16381eae2cd1.jpg "IMG_1260[1].JPG")
At some point, someone had a half dollar that they used as their own little "science experiment". They dipped it in molten lead, solder, or some other very soft medal, resulting in the hideous abomination I picked from the dirt. Perhaps it was a younger individual, embarrassed by what he had done, and hid the coin in the horse barn so that his parents wouldn't find out.
Decades later, a confused detectorist would stumble upon said embarrassing science experiment, and initially become completely befuddled. But after dedicating coin-handling, harsh cleaning, much mouth-breathing-upon, and staring, the Walking Liberty half-dollar rose again.
![IMG_1275[1].JPG](https://www.treasurenet.com/data/attachments/1110/1110316-5ea5764182a7cc5ac9e6846760dc8405.jpg "IMG_1275[1].JPG")
![IMG_1276[1].JPG](https://www.treasurenet.com/data/attachments/1110/1110337-371958a19d17298f596d7553716aa63d.jpg "IMG_1276[1].JPG")
While the smell-test pretty much solves it for me, since nothing stinks quite like silver, I'm going get it acid tested just to be sure. But if after removing a full layer of mystery metal it actually comes back not silver.. then I'm taking a vacation.
-mcl
Warning: this is story time.
I wasn't going to post my finds from last weekend. Up until today I'd been pretty disgusted by what I'd found. I'm going to share the story of my find that caused a serious back-and-forth between excitement and let-down, over and over, as I tried to determine whether I had found a piece of both intrinsic and extrinsic value, or evidence of shameful activity which had been hidden by a guilty culprit.
This all started when I wasn't able to detect at my usual spot. At least, not really. Normally I dig at the site of an old coal mining community, which has yielded some fun artifacts from the 1890s to 1910s. Unfortunately, due to the full swing of agriculture at this point of the year, I was only able to detect in a tiny percentage of the land area, none of which falls in the "prime spots" I have on my list from historical research. I decided to go out anyway and give it a shot. It was about 80 degrees with dump water on your face humidity levels. I was still in the process of walking to the site when all of a sudden I realized that the right half of my upper lip, mouth, and nose area were completely numb and swollen to twice the normal size. In my confusion I started looking at the rest of my body and noticed that I had at least half a dozen welts the size of a quarter, and it became clear immediately what had happened: I'm horribly allergic to mosquito bites, and they love, love, love me. I returned to base camp to get some insect repellent, and even though I felt like puking, I went out to find some treasure.
Four hours of hunting later it was 9AM, the heat had cranked, the mosquitoes had laughed their way through the repellent, and all I had to show for my troubles were two freezer bags full of rusty junk, and part of the frame from the movement of a late 1890s wall clock. The latter might excite some people, but that stupid clock is the bane of my existence. Over the last year, I have perpetually dug more and more pieces of that clock over the spread of about 5 acres of land, each time thinking it will be something better than a brass gear. Pretty soon I'm going to be able to rebuild that blasted thing.
Realizing that this was a hopeless endeavor, I sent a text to someone asking permission to detect an old barn on his property. I knew it was falling down and full of decades-old manure, but I figured I'd give it a shot for a few minutes. Well, the owner replied and told me to go on ahead. He also said, "try the south end.. I just have a feeling, can't explain it."
I got there at about 4PM, and after meeting the family dog and setting some ground rules, I walked in the south door of the barn.
When I got in, it was seriously like being on another planet. I don't know what has transpired in the 20 or so years since I had last seen the inside of that barn, but there were these tunnels the size of basket balls that dipped in an out of the dirt floor everywhere. It looked like I was walking on a giant slice of Swiss cheese. There was some kind of mammalian skull sitting in the loose, dry dirt, and there were at least a dozen swallows protesting my presence by swooping around me and making hideous noises. There was about 10 square feet of room to walk amongst the holes and junk piled in there. I almost noped out immediately. But I decided to turn on the detector and just see what would happen. It was weird, because I turned it on, made a single sweep, and got a hit. I checked to make sure I wasn't set to "all metal" or something.. Nope, tone mode set to hyperspace, sensitivity set to low. I double checked to make sure there really was something there, and there was. The dirt was weird -- it was very, very dry and crumbly, almost like little pellets. I didn't even need my shovel, I just grasped at the dirt and felt something in my hand. Lo and behold, after three steps into the barn and detecting for less than ten seconds, I found this this in my hand:
I almost never find anything actually good, and certainly not the second I turn on my detector. Further, the sheer ridiculousness of having had the property owner tell me to "try the south end, I just have a feeling", followed by me finding silver immediately.. I dialed up the homeowner from the barn and asked, "did you salt me?"
"What?" he asked.
"You're not going to believe this."
He came outside, and after a quick rinse and a look through a loupe, we confirmed that I had found a Walking Liberty half-dollar. I expected him to claim it, but he said "it's all yours. Let me know if you find anything else."
I spent the next two hours scouring that barn, digging through old horse manure. While I did find a couple more things, the silver was the best. Or so I had thought.
Back in the light at basecamp, I noticed something weird. The coin had a weird shine to the surface, almost like it was coated in wax. Lightly rubbing it on anything made it worse.
The features of the coin were hardly noticeable. I wanted to get to the bottom of this, but I had to get back to my own house to do any serious cleaning. To be honest, I knew that the coin was in no condition to have numismatic value, so I figured I had nothing to lose by cleaning it. I found a thread on treasurenet about a technique for cleaning old silver, in which a bowl is lined with foil, the coin is placed inside with some baking soda, and boiling water is poured in for five minutes. I tested this on two other silver coins first, and after good results, I took some last pictures of the half-dollar in case I somehow toasted it.
No matter what I did, I couldn't with certainty lift a date. The crayon-like surface had only gotten worse.
I started the cleaning process. But after three run-throughs with boiling water and baking soda, literally nothing was changing. I kept at it. For an hour and a half. All of a sudden, after taking it out after a late run, the coin had turned a bizarre tan/green color from its former dark maroon.
It was legitimately starting to look worse than when I had started. I started to get concerned.
Later I noticed.. something was flaking off. I could move the surface of the coin by pushing with the back of my fingernail. Or soft plastic. Or anything.
Then I looked through a magnifying glass and noticed that the coin basically didn't have any reeding whatsoever. I started to realize this coin might not be real. I put it on a scale and it registered at 11.25 grams... I knew it could just be that it was worn, but all of the factors adding up.. no reeding, no detail, can be deformed by light pressure.. I knew the people who owned that property when this coin would have been minted. Could they have have counterfeited a half-dollar? It only made matters worse when further cleaning led to the sudden development of a bizarre oxidation layer:
Bewildered, I scratched at the piece with my fingernail and saw tiny piece of metal flaking away with each scratch!
I was pretty upset, so I took some actual polish to it, and noted that even after I had gotten it nice and shiny, it didn't ring at all like silver. It just made a dull "thud". I spent the rest of the evening clawing at the stupid thing, wondering why these people I knew had been so idiotic to have made a backyard fake silver coin. I was legitimately furious at the idea, and after much handling the coin had turned my hands dark grey like after you hand-sharpen an old pencil, I tossed the coin on a shelf, washed my hands, and went to bed.
A week later, I picked it up again. And I noticed two things. First, whereas there had been basically no reeding on the edges of the coin before, suddenly I noticed that there were quite visible reeds. I scratched at them a bit in disbelief. The more I did, the more reeds I saw. And I scratched and scratched at various areas until flakes and splinters stopped coming off. Suddenly, the coin didn't have the strange reflection on the surface it did before. And when I smelled my hands, they reeked of old onions -- exactly the way all silver smells in very short order if it sits out in the open in my house. I went and compared the smell to a sterling ring on the shelf nearby, and, as ridiculous as it sounds, the smell test clinched it for me.. it really is a silver half-dollar. And sure, it's worn pretty badly and you still can't read the date. But it isn't made of lead, or pewter, or whatever the hell I had in my hands in the first place. I tossed it on the scale again to find that I had scratched off just over 100 milligrams of metallic coating from the coin. I gave it a flick, and it had the gratifying, long-lasting "pringgggg" of coin silver. No more thuds. Satisfied that it could no longer be easily scratched by plastic cups or fingernails, I pieced together what had happened.
At some point, someone had a half dollar that they used as their own little "science experiment". They dipped it in molten lead, solder, or some other very soft medal, resulting in the hideous abomination I picked from the dirt. Perhaps it was a younger individual, embarrassed by what he had done, and hid the coin in the horse barn so that his parents wouldn't find out.
Decades later, a confused detectorist would stumble upon said embarrassing science experiment, and initially become completely befuddled. But after dedicating coin-handling, harsh cleaning, much mouth-breathing-upon, and staring, the Walking Liberty half-dollar rose again.
While the smell-test pretty much solves it for me, since nothing stinks quite like silver, I'm going get it acid tested just to be sure. But if after removing a full layer of mystery metal it actually comes back not silver.. then I'm taking a vacation.
-mcl
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