Two "What is it"s...item and site

[Skrimpy]

Went out to a site Shootncoin and I frequent yesterday. I've posted about it a couple times before. Late 1600s-early 1900s mill. Changed hands several times, was at one time grist mill, saw mill, textile mill and probably any other mill you can think of. Shootncoin found this neat lead button looking thing. I think maybe a wax seal press (is that what they are called?). Anyone got any ideas?

One other question maybe some of you can help us with. We've been to this site maybe 10-15 times now. The first maybe two times we got a couple of coins. If I remember correctly, one seated dime, two flying eagles, two indians and a V nickel. Since then only modern coins comparably. 1949 quarter, and several Lincolns. The mill closed down before 1949 and my guess is this quarter was dropped by a hunter (there are bullet shells everywhere). My problem is this. We KILL buttons there. I think between the two of us we've found probably 100 buttons. One or two military, but mostly civilian. Our guess is that this was a textile mill and that is why there are so many but...why the lack of coins? We don't suspect this place has been picked over because we just keep finding the buttons (and they ring up like copper pennies). It's gotten to the point where we leave there with maybe 5-10 buttons each. Any of you got any ideas? Were people doing business with the mill just really careful with their money? Or do we just stink at this?

[TxTim]

Lead seal?

[Bigcypresshunter]

Lead seal?

I thought the same thing. Is it lead? Can you tell us what it says or post a larger picture?

[taz42o]

Lead seal.
Cloth , bag or bale seal they are called.
Two halves are connected by the tab sticking out the side.

Many pics here.

http://ourpasthistory.com/Gallerya/m...2_itemId=15431

They are folded over and pressed with one of these, with a company stamp.

http://www.americancasting.com/info-...bulldog-sp.asp

[chopz54]

Bag seal--got loads of these.

[Skrimpy]

Yeah. It's lead. It's some kind of key on one side and initials and a name on the other. HZA Bac(letter)an? S.
Anyone have any thought as to why we arent finding many coins here? With the number of buttons we are finding it seems we should be finding more coins.

[Bigcypresshunter]

I would imagine there are not many coins there or you may not be in the best spot where people would lose or exchange money. The lead seal is a cool find.

[Skrimpy]

I would understand if there "weren't any coins there", except for the fact that there are loads and I mean LOADS of buttons (we've made maybe 8-10 trips there and have about 100 buttons in aggregate). Historically, this mill is considered a "paper mill", but it did (as mills often did) exchange hands many times and spent time not only as a paper mill but in the beginning a grist mill and at one point textile mill (thus all the buttons most likely from recycled clothing)...but again, with all the activity, I would tend to think there would be way, way more coins than we have found.

[jefg231]

Nice