time4me
Bronze Member
- Aug 30, 2005
- 1,296
- 44
- Detector(s) used
- E-Trac, Explorer II, Excalibur
To Grandmother's house I go - (lots of pictures)
This past weekend was my 25th high school class reunion in Michigan. Since the trip back "home" is over 2000 miles, I decided to fly in Friday night, and return on Monday. Back in August I contacted the man who bought my grandma's house around 30 years ago and got permission from the owner to detect both Saturday and Sunday, even though he would be at work both days.
Back in the mid to late 1970’s, my older brother and I went around my grandma's yard a lot with our White's Coinmaster. Of course I don't think we really knew how to ground balance it and tune it all that well, but we made some decent finds back then nonetheless. Now over thirty years later, I was returning to the house that my grandparents built in the 1920's, and that my mom and her four sisters were born in and grew up in.
On the flight to Michigan Friday afternoon, I had all sorts of visions of what I might find, but my real goal was to find at least one personal item that I could tie back to my grandparents, my mom, or one of her sisters. Something that one of them would have used at one point or another.
Saturday was the day of my class reunion, but it wasn't scheduled to begin until 8:00pm at night. I had plans to drive to Midland, to visit my Aunt and Uncle on my dad’s side for lunch. By the time I got back to my hometown, I had a few hours to kill before having to clean up and head out to my reunion, and it looked like the rain that was forecast for Saturday was going to hold off for a while yet. So I drove over to my Grandma’s house to begin searching for that personal item.
When I arrived at my Grandma’s house, I saw that it had been very nicely remodeled, but that the footprint was generally the same. The front porch had been changed, and the breezeway between the house and the garage had been removed. There was also an addition built onto the back. But the yard looked pretty much as I had remembered it from all those years ago.
Detecting proved a bit difficult, as there are now two giant power towers directly across the street from the house. I think my E-Trac was picking up a lot of interference from these electrical towers, no matter how often I tried changing channels. Regardless of the erratic behavior I was experiencing, I was not going to be deterred.
My first signal from the front yard turned out to be a silver plated spoon with most of the silver plate worn off…
As much as I hoped that there would be an initial engraved on the spoon, it was not to be. But, in a way I had achieved my goal already – a spoon was a pretty personal item to a family back in the 20’s – 40’s. Certainly not cheap, and probably sorely missed in the flatware drawer. Sitting there turning the spoon in my hands, I could imagine my mom and her sisters holding a high tea party in the front yard. Maybe it started to rain, and they hurriedly gathered up their tea cups and flatware, only to drop one spoon in the tall grass on their mad dash back to the house. Smiling, I dropped this treasure into my bag and continued on.
Finds were scarce in the front yard. In the next half-hour, I had two wheat cents and several memorial cents to show for my efforts. Turns out that one of the wheat cents was dated 1929, the year my mom was born. Another smile on my face! The other wheat cent was a 1937.
Next I moved to the side of the house. Again, interference was hindering me, and good signals were very scarce. Just when I was wondering to myself if my brother and I had done a better job detecting this yard back in the 70’s than I gave us credit for, I got a sweet high-tone that read 45-46 on the E-Trac. Silver! I carefully dug a plug dreaming of barber dimes and standing liberty quarters, when a tiny little bent disk emerged from the earth. Carefully wiping the dirt away with trembling fingers, I could read the date – 1964. A 1964 silver Roosevelt dime. Ok, not so much of a smile as I dropped what turned out to be the only silver coin I’d find in the yard into my pouch.
Not far from the bent silver dime I received another solid high-tone in the 46-47 range, which gave hope of another silver coin. Digging down about 7 or 8 inches, I discovered a small ball caked in dirt. When I began wiping away the dirt, I got my smile back.
It was a small brass bell that must have fallen off of a leather harness or collar. I immediately thought of the stories my mom often told of the cow that her family owned that was always escaping and being chased all around the yard and the field. Of course there was also the story of the horse that they owned that died in the barn one winter, and my grandpa had to saw off its frozen legs in order to get it through the door. Could this bell have fallen off of either of these animals? I’d like to think so.
The next find brought yet another smile to my face.
It was a sterling silver pen with an art deco design, but unfortunately it was pretty beat up. As with the spoon I had found earlier, I searched for initials on the pen but did not find any markings other than “STERLING.” I noticed that the pocket clip was missing, and thought maybe that’s where some initials might be, so I went back into the hole with my Sun-Ray probe and found the clip. But it was not to be – no initials. Still, it was another personal item that was likely used by my grandfather at some point in time, and probably slipped from his shirt pocket when he bent over to pick something up.
In the same general area where the pen was found, I dug a big round copper disk that really got my heart racing. I thought for sure it was a token or claim-tag of some sort. However, cleaning the dirt from both sides did not reveal any distinguishing marks. I ended up finding four of these copper disks during the hunt, all in the yard back behind the house.
At the edge of the back yard is a bare dirt area that goes back about 20 feet or so with some small trees scattered throughout the area. I was able to quickly determine that this was the trash pit, as there were many detections at all tone ranges, and lots of broken pieces of glass lying about. At this point I decided to switch to my 4 x 6 inch elliptical coil to try to pick out some good signals from all of the trash. One of the first items dug in this area was this very cool radio plate…
And near where I found this plate, I unearthed this volume control knob…
Again, I let my mind drift to a vision of my grandpa trying to tune Benny Goodman on the Radiola 28, only to realize it had stopped working. After fiddling with it for a while, he gave up and hauled it out back and busted it up into pieces for the trash pit. A little research shows that the RCA Radiola 28 was released in September of 1925. There were 84,978 of this model produced, and they cost $260.00 – definitely a princely sum back in the 1920’s.
Here is a picture of a complete Radiola 28 that I found online, in which you can see the brass plate and control knobs…
As I continued scanning very slowly to try to pick out signals worth digging, I got a nice solid, repeatable mid to high tone, and found what looks to be a child’s bracelet. Again, another “personal” item likely lost or thrown out by one of the five girls that grew up in this house…
You’ll see in this picture of the bracelet that I couldn’t help but add a few of the interesting pieces of glass to my pouch when they appeared in the holes I dug. There was broken glass everywhere under the surface in this trash pit area.
One of the really cool items I found in the “trash pit” area was the top of a woman’s compact. I think the top might be silver, as it came out of the ground looking pretty silver, and cleaned up really nice. I love the design on this item. I just wish that the enamel around the edge was all intact and that the compact was complete. Regardless, it was still another “personal” item that one of the ladies in the house had used, and it brought a big smile to my face when I found it.
Next I detected the lid of a small “Ponds” cream jar, to which the jar was still attached. And near this find, I came up with another “Ponds” jar without the lid, but about 10 feet away I found a lid, so I screwed it on the lid-less bottle…
With this next discovery, I think things got a little too personal…
It is a small tin that held steam-cured and sterilized “Merry Widows” condoms – 3 for $1.00. Eeeeeeewwwwwww. Not the sort of “personal” item I was hoping to find, but definitely something that someone in the house had used when there really wasn’t an alternative. Actually, this find probably brought the biggest smile to my face that turned into a chuckle.
I realized I was out of time and had to get back to my hotel to clean up and get to my class reunion. I prayed that it wouldn’t rain on Sunday as I wanted to come back and spend another few hours in this trash pit area, and rescan the yard some more.
On Sunday I was lucky to get in about another hour of detecting before the rain came. I didn’t find too much more in this hour, but they did turn out to be “personal” items used and lost by my grandparents or one of their five daughters. An interesting buckle…
A suspender clip…
And a very interesting bottle…
So after two relatively short hunts over two days at Grandma’s house, I ended up with what I consider to be some really nice treasures that together make for a great display for my mom and my own siblings to enjoy looking at…
Some day I would love to return to Grandma’s house and spend a day or two digging out and sifting that dirt trash-pit area. Maybe if I offer the homeowner a nicely landscaped garden when I am done he’d allow me to do this. Either way, it is another treasure hunting adventure to dream about.
Happy Hunting,
Jim
This past weekend was my 25th high school class reunion in Michigan. Since the trip back "home" is over 2000 miles, I decided to fly in Friday night, and return on Monday. Back in August I contacted the man who bought my grandma's house around 30 years ago and got permission from the owner to detect both Saturday and Sunday, even though he would be at work both days.
Back in the mid to late 1970’s, my older brother and I went around my grandma's yard a lot with our White's Coinmaster. Of course I don't think we really knew how to ground balance it and tune it all that well, but we made some decent finds back then nonetheless. Now over thirty years later, I was returning to the house that my grandparents built in the 1920's, and that my mom and her four sisters were born in and grew up in.
On the flight to Michigan Friday afternoon, I had all sorts of visions of what I might find, but my real goal was to find at least one personal item that I could tie back to my grandparents, my mom, or one of her sisters. Something that one of them would have used at one point or another.
Saturday was the day of my class reunion, but it wasn't scheduled to begin until 8:00pm at night. I had plans to drive to Midland, to visit my Aunt and Uncle on my dad’s side for lunch. By the time I got back to my hometown, I had a few hours to kill before having to clean up and head out to my reunion, and it looked like the rain that was forecast for Saturday was going to hold off for a while yet. So I drove over to my Grandma’s house to begin searching for that personal item.
When I arrived at my Grandma’s house, I saw that it had been very nicely remodeled, but that the footprint was generally the same. The front porch had been changed, and the breezeway between the house and the garage had been removed. There was also an addition built onto the back. But the yard looked pretty much as I had remembered it from all those years ago.
Detecting proved a bit difficult, as there are now two giant power towers directly across the street from the house. I think my E-Trac was picking up a lot of interference from these electrical towers, no matter how often I tried changing channels. Regardless of the erratic behavior I was experiencing, I was not going to be deterred.
My first signal from the front yard turned out to be a silver plated spoon with most of the silver plate worn off…
As much as I hoped that there would be an initial engraved on the spoon, it was not to be. But, in a way I had achieved my goal already – a spoon was a pretty personal item to a family back in the 20’s – 40’s. Certainly not cheap, and probably sorely missed in the flatware drawer. Sitting there turning the spoon in my hands, I could imagine my mom and her sisters holding a high tea party in the front yard. Maybe it started to rain, and they hurriedly gathered up their tea cups and flatware, only to drop one spoon in the tall grass on their mad dash back to the house. Smiling, I dropped this treasure into my bag and continued on.
Finds were scarce in the front yard. In the next half-hour, I had two wheat cents and several memorial cents to show for my efforts. Turns out that one of the wheat cents was dated 1929, the year my mom was born. Another smile on my face! The other wheat cent was a 1937.
Next I moved to the side of the house. Again, interference was hindering me, and good signals were very scarce. Just when I was wondering to myself if my brother and I had done a better job detecting this yard back in the 70’s than I gave us credit for, I got a sweet high-tone that read 45-46 on the E-Trac. Silver! I carefully dug a plug dreaming of barber dimes and standing liberty quarters, when a tiny little bent disk emerged from the earth. Carefully wiping the dirt away with trembling fingers, I could read the date – 1964. A 1964 silver Roosevelt dime. Ok, not so much of a smile as I dropped what turned out to be the only silver coin I’d find in the yard into my pouch.
Not far from the bent silver dime I received another solid high-tone in the 46-47 range, which gave hope of another silver coin. Digging down about 7 or 8 inches, I discovered a small ball caked in dirt. When I began wiping away the dirt, I got my smile back.
It was a small brass bell that must have fallen off of a leather harness or collar. I immediately thought of the stories my mom often told of the cow that her family owned that was always escaping and being chased all around the yard and the field. Of course there was also the story of the horse that they owned that died in the barn one winter, and my grandpa had to saw off its frozen legs in order to get it through the door. Could this bell have fallen off of either of these animals? I’d like to think so.
The next find brought yet another smile to my face.
It was a sterling silver pen with an art deco design, but unfortunately it was pretty beat up. As with the spoon I had found earlier, I searched for initials on the pen but did not find any markings other than “STERLING.” I noticed that the pocket clip was missing, and thought maybe that’s where some initials might be, so I went back into the hole with my Sun-Ray probe and found the clip. But it was not to be – no initials. Still, it was another personal item that was likely used by my grandfather at some point in time, and probably slipped from his shirt pocket when he bent over to pick something up.
In the same general area where the pen was found, I dug a big round copper disk that really got my heart racing. I thought for sure it was a token or claim-tag of some sort. However, cleaning the dirt from both sides did not reveal any distinguishing marks. I ended up finding four of these copper disks during the hunt, all in the yard back behind the house.
At the edge of the back yard is a bare dirt area that goes back about 20 feet or so with some small trees scattered throughout the area. I was able to quickly determine that this was the trash pit, as there were many detections at all tone ranges, and lots of broken pieces of glass lying about. At this point I decided to switch to my 4 x 6 inch elliptical coil to try to pick out some good signals from all of the trash. One of the first items dug in this area was this very cool radio plate…
And near where I found this plate, I unearthed this volume control knob…
Again, I let my mind drift to a vision of my grandpa trying to tune Benny Goodman on the Radiola 28, only to realize it had stopped working. After fiddling with it for a while, he gave up and hauled it out back and busted it up into pieces for the trash pit. A little research shows that the RCA Radiola 28 was released in September of 1925. There were 84,978 of this model produced, and they cost $260.00 – definitely a princely sum back in the 1920’s.
Here is a picture of a complete Radiola 28 that I found online, in which you can see the brass plate and control knobs…
As I continued scanning very slowly to try to pick out signals worth digging, I got a nice solid, repeatable mid to high tone, and found what looks to be a child’s bracelet. Again, another “personal” item likely lost or thrown out by one of the five girls that grew up in this house…
You’ll see in this picture of the bracelet that I couldn’t help but add a few of the interesting pieces of glass to my pouch when they appeared in the holes I dug. There was broken glass everywhere under the surface in this trash pit area.
One of the really cool items I found in the “trash pit” area was the top of a woman’s compact. I think the top might be silver, as it came out of the ground looking pretty silver, and cleaned up really nice. I love the design on this item. I just wish that the enamel around the edge was all intact and that the compact was complete. Regardless, it was still another “personal” item that one of the ladies in the house had used, and it brought a big smile to my face when I found it.
Next I detected the lid of a small “Ponds” cream jar, to which the jar was still attached. And near this find, I came up with another “Ponds” jar without the lid, but about 10 feet away I found a lid, so I screwed it on the lid-less bottle…
With this next discovery, I think things got a little too personal…
It is a small tin that held steam-cured and sterilized “Merry Widows” condoms – 3 for $1.00. Eeeeeeewwwwwww. Not the sort of “personal” item I was hoping to find, but definitely something that someone in the house had used when there really wasn’t an alternative. Actually, this find probably brought the biggest smile to my face that turned into a chuckle.
I realized I was out of time and had to get back to my hotel to clean up and get to my class reunion. I prayed that it wouldn’t rain on Sunday as I wanted to come back and spend another few hours in this trash pit area, and rescan the yard some more.
On Sunday I was lucky to get in about another hour of detecting before the rain came. I didn’t find too much more in this hour, but they did turn out to be “personal” items used and lost by my grandparents or one of their five daughters. An interesting buckle…
A suspender clip…
And a very interesting bottle…
So after two relatively short hunts over two days at Grandma’s house, I ended up with what I consider to be some really nice treasures that together make for a great display for my mom and my own siblings to enjoy looking at…
Some day I would love to return to Grandma’s house and spend a day or two digging out and sifting that dirt trash-pit area. Maybe if I offer the homeowner a nicely landscaped garden when I am done he’d allow me to do this. Either way, it is another treasure hunting adventure to dream about.
Happy Hunting,
Jim
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