May have found a ghost town

[alabamadan]

So last fall I'm hunting with some guys and we're out riding around when I notice a couple of old cars and I even comment that the trail we're on is really nice. One of the old guys says, this used to be the old highway back way back when. Where we're standing now used to be downtown <old town name>. Short of an old rusted out 1940s car, there's nothing around anymore that I can see. Should I do any research or just start swinging? If so, where do I start?

BTW, I'm not an experienced MDer and all I have is an ACE 250.

Thanks,

 

[deepskyal]

If I were you.....I'd walk around the area and search for foundations.....detect and see where you find large amounts of nails, iron, whatnots from houses being torn down.
If you were in the middle of town....you should be able to stumble across some evidence of buildings...bricks, glass...

Look for indentations in the ground where a basement may have been...raised piles from possible bulldozing....

Big old trees in groups could indicate yards or boundaries....laundry lines....

Areas with lots of tall grasses may have been a lawn. Look for overgrown flower beds....daffodiles survive many, many years. Ornamental shrubs.....flowering or fruit trees....

Save your homework, (research) for rainy days. Get out while weeds are low and use your eyes.

If you know the exact location...use google earth and get your aerial current view. That will help you catch sight of anomilies...old walls, roads that are overgrown may just jump out at you on Google Earth.

Go to the maps forum on here and check to see what maps may be from your area...Sanborn maps are old fire insurance maps and very detailed...from the late 1800's up.

But...dont go there without your detector......odds are, you'll kick yourself in the butt if you leave it at home.

Al

 

[johnnycat]

If I were you.....I'd walk around the area and search for foundations.....detect and see where you find large amounts of nails, iron, whatnots from houses being torn down.
If you were in the middle of town....you should be able to stumble across some evidence of buildings...bricks, glass...

Look for indentations in the ground where a basement may have been...raised piles from possible bulldozing....

Big old trees in groups could indicate yards or boundaries....laundry lines....

Areas with lots of tall grasses may have been a lawn. Look for overgrown flower beds....daffodiles survive many, many years. Ornamental shrubs.....flowering or fruit trees....

Save your homework, (research) for rainy days. Get out while weeds are low and use your eyes.

If you know the exact location...use google earth and get your aerial current view. That will help you catch sight of anomilies...old walls, roads that are overgrown may just jump out at you on Google Earth.

Go to the maps forum on here and check to see what maps may be from your area...Sanborn maps are old fire insurance maps and very detailed...from the late 1800's up.

But...dont go there without your detector......odds are, you'll kick yourself in the butt if you leave it at home.

Al

That about covers it.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

deepskyal does a good job at telling you where to start hunting. I would add that words like "town" or "village" have a different meaning now, than they did 150 or more years ago. There was a time when the term "town" was often-times applied to nothing more than a collection of 6 or 7 neighbors, within a mile or so of each other. Ie.: more or less just a cross-roads or geographic name-sakes, with perhaps a post-office with the name-sake. Not a "town" in the current sense of the word, with laid out streets, stores, parks, etc.... And remember too, just having a "post office" for your "town" meant nothing. To get the govt. to christen a post office somewhere, all you had to do was show that you represented a certain # of neighbors, and you could get a "post office" which was basically nothing more than your front porch, where a few other neighbors came to get their mail from now and then.

 

[alabamadan]

Well the place is a few hours from here, so I looked on some maps. It was around during the Civil War and at least up to 1888. I haven't been able to find any maps from the 20th century online of a rural Mississippi town. It does appear that it was on the railroad line, so it's probably a stop. From the maps I have, the road that now dead ends into another one used to continue straight. Interesting stuff. Where does one find those old topo maps that show buildings and stuff?