Detecting an early 1900’s coal mining site

[pa-dirt_nc-sand]

Hit an old coal mining site in the city woods this weekend. Hit the jackpot of miners tags and some other interesting finds.

 

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[ToddsPoint]

Love that 1919 merc!

 

[robertk]

Very cool finds!

 

[E-Trac-Ohio]

Wow ... that's fantastic - never seen so many Miner's Tags found - well done !

 

[pepperj]

Those tags must of sounded up loud, well done on the recoveries.

 

[Blackfoot58]

I’m amazed at how many times a harmonica piece is found. They must have been carried by a lot of folks.

 

[GaRebel1861]

There's got to be more silver there!

 

[BennyV]

View attachment 2100725
Hit an old coal mining site in the city woods this weekend. Hit the jackpot of miners tags and some other interesting finds.

Very nice

 

[fishstick]

That's crazy cool. Congratz

 

[Timbermaster]

Lotta cool stuff!

 

[Digger RJ]

View attachment 2100725
Hit an old coal mining site in the city woods this weekend. Hit the jackpot of miners tags and some other interesting finds.

Very Nice!!!! Older Merc!!! Congrats!!!

 

[scruggs]

CONGRATS ON YOUR NICE FINDS!

 

[giuhalftrack]

some harmonica pieces

 

[ArfieBoy]

Congratulations on all the old miner tags! Nice Merc dime, too. Over the years I have many, many harmonica reeds. Didn't keep them all but still have a few. Harmonicas were cheap, easy to carry, and you could make music with them anywhere.

 

[DownEast_Detecting]

well done pa-dirt_nc-sand! Nice site, nice layout, nice finds, and nice post.
So if you found all the tags at once. Do you think its where they hung them all up on a hook or post, while they were inside? Or did someone discard them after they were all collected when the mine was shutting down.

also is that a giant hole in the road? LOL....or is that a river bed or something.

 

[Gare]

View attachment 2100725
Hit an old coal mining site in the city woods this weekend. Hit the jackpot of miners tags and some other interesting finds.

GREAT FIND SIR

 

[pa-dirt_nc-sand]

well done pa-dirt_nc-sand! Nice site, nice layout, nice finds, and nice post.
So if you found all the tags at once. Do you think its where they hung them all up on a hook or post, while they were inside? Or did someone discard them after they were all collected when the mine was shutting down.

also is that a giant hole in the road? LOL....or is that a river bed or something.
View attachment 2100878

From the lidar image you can see all the coal pit holes. Some are small 10’ diameter and only 5’ deep some are 30’ diameter and 20’ deep. The tags were all over the flat area between the road and the pits. There was one spill of 8 tags along with the brass ring holder. The miners and mines used the tags to keep track of who dug what amount of coal. The big cut looks like a dried up ravine. The whole area is wooded now, but very swingable, but with all the coal pits it has a weird unnatural feel and the ground is full of iron. Thx

 

[jose159]

Great suff!! I love detecting the old mine sites as I have many old mines within walking distance from my house. I also love finding the old miners tags and never have found that many in one spot. Ya done good...lol

 

[DownEast_Detecting]

From the lidar image you can see all the coal pit holes. Some are small 10’ diameter and only 5’ deep some are 30’ diameter and 20’ deep. The tags were all over the flat area between the road and the pits. There was one spill of 8 tags along with the brass ring holder. The miners and mines used the tags to keep track of who dug what amount of coal. The big cut looks like a dried up ravine. The whole area is wooded now, but very swingable, but with all the coal pits it has a weird unnatural feel and the ground is full of iron. Thx

ok neat. I thought they must have something to do with your coal site. But i only knew of the deep coal mines. i didnt know they extracted it in shallow pits like that on the surface. But i'm also not from coal country.
So now i know a second use for the tags. I always thought they were just for making sure everyone was out of the mine alive. They would all hang there tag on a hook as there were heading down. And pick it back up on their way out, so if there was a tag left hanging they knew someone was still below. So how did these tags work to keep track of the workers quota? Did the have them on their own carts or on a post in front of their pile or how did that work.
so that big swath i called a road or river bed is their main cut where they extracted it?

 

[jose159]

The ones I found have the mine name(usually a number) and the miners ID number and job description(loader or scrapper) The reason for this is because a lot of these mines were connected to each other miles underground. When I worked in the mines in the late 70s all the miners had a number that was put on the cap lamp charger outside the mine to show that if the cap lamp was missing the miner was still in the mine. This was much different in the early 1900 hundreds