halfdime
Silver Member
- Joined
- Oct 31, 2006
- Messages
- 4,514
- Reaction score
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- Location
- Zelienople
- Detector(s) used
- White's XLT
What a beautiful day to be out in Pennsylvania! I took halfdime Jr. over to my mother's house so I could head out to the woods for some tranquility. Mom wasn't home yet, so I turned on the detector and headed out to the end of the property, then some. The neighboring borough has a plot of ground adjacent to hers that I've done a little detecting on; today, I managed a 61D Rosey in the same hole as a 52D wheat. When Mom arrived, she apologized for being late; my reply, of course, was not to sweat it, I plucked a silver Rosey while I was waiting. "What's a Rosey?" "Oh, sorry, a silver Roosevelt dime." I went out to the woods in a sweatshirt, but just the hike in to our foundation worked up a sweat so I shed it. I spent the afternoon in short sleeves and it was heavenly! My intention was to begin excavating what may have been an outhouse, and that's where I started. As I got down a little bit, I ran into a clay layer that made me suspect that it might not have been an outhouse; we may pursue this in the future, but I moved on to what was probably a summer kitchen closer to the house. I started to excavate here, moving stone and other debris before I could actually start digging. As soon as the shovel got involved, this larger silver plated spoon appeared. About a foot below ground level, I ran into clay again. That's probably to be expected. I assume that they probably had a wooden floor that was either removed or has rotted away. This was a farm that appears on an atlas of 1876, but is gone when aerial photos were taken in the late 1930's. I probably cleared 2/3 of the floor area down to clay, and late in the afternoon turned up the second, smaller plated spoon. We now have strong evidence, if not actual proof, that these folks ate with utensils and not like someone you'd see (like Bruce Dern maybe, or Festus) on Gunsmoke. I put the top layers of soil off to the side for sifting later; there are modern (1970's) beer cans littering the area so badly that using the detector on that dirt is fruitless. Once the clay appears, I do run the detector over it and it has been pretty signal free.
The next few days I'll probably focus on getting our baseball field ready for practice; the ground is finally thawed and drying, and the dirt is perfect for working (just like detecting, really). I'll be thinking about Thursday, though, when I'm supposed to be introduced to a local church camp that dates from the 1870's. That's a story that will have to wait for another day.
The next few days I'll probably focus on getting our baseball field ready for practice; the ground is finally thawed and drying, and the dirt is perfect for working (just like detecting, really). I'll be thinking about Thursday, though, when I'm supposed to be introduced to a local church camp that dates from the 1870's. That's a story that will have to wait for another day.
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