Danimal
Bronze Member
- Joined
- Aug 16, 2006
- Messages
- 1,142
- Reaction score
- 165
- Golden Thread
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- Location
- Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio
- Detector(s) used
- duh...duh... DFX
The monkey's off my back! 1st large cent (Draped Bust) and some old silver too
As some of you may remember, I recently posted how I had received permission from the State to hunt some state-owned land that is normally verbotten to metal detecting. Old maps I found (1906) show over 30 homes on land that is now state property. Some of the roads are still is use, some closed and some are now part of a bridal trail system. My permission expired today (they only gave me a two week window) so...with this beautiful fall weather I wanted to make the most of it..so yesterday (Saturday) my son Spencer and I joined Bob (Mirage from TNet) for an all day hunt in the woods.
We planned on trying to check out seven cellar holes in an area of about 4 square miles. The first was right off the road and easily found. Right away we started hitting wheaties and I popped a 1954 Rosie early on to get the silver train rolling. Bob also scored some nice coins there (I'll let him post his finds so as to not spoil the fun) with one of his coins dating the spot to at least the turn of the century. These homes were all abandoned/bought out/demolished around 1960 from what I learned. Some research of mine (calls to the county's archivist who looked up some even older maps on microfilm for me) seemed to indicate that NONE of the homes would be any older than around 1870. Sooo...we expected to maybe find IHs and maybe even some Seated silver. Seeing as how a silver quarter older than a SLQ was one of the top on my list of "not found yets" I was full of hope.
The next spot we looked for was four cellarholes but required a long hike. I forgot my GPS but we had good sat.photos and old topo maps so we thought we could find them. Eventually we DID find some debris...sq. nails, old door hinge...bricks, but never really even found a depression or sign of a cellarhole.
Spencer in the meantime...grew bored with swinging the Ace250 (hey...he's 13 and needs constant coins to stay focused) so he went off on an adventure using a CO2 powered 6mm airsoft pistol. Dunno how many rounds he fired, but at one time I caught a glimpse of him with the pistol held up by his head doing his best Bond impression while trying to stalk a squirrel that was high up in the huge forrest canopy (don't worry folks...at that range and with a toy gun I doubt if he could do more that make a squirrel mad even if he did get a lucky shot in)..anyways...he was thouroughly amused and it kept him busy while we hunted.
We took a break for lunch and decided to hike out and hit two other cellarholes that were on a closed down roads right near where I parked. We kinda got lost and...using the sun's position ended up pointed kinda in the right direction again...and came out of the woods maybe 400 yds from where I parked the Element.
(BTW, I didn't take any pics of Saturday's adventure but Bob did...maybe he'll post some)
At the first of the two cellarholes again we hit wheats and then a GREAT high 80's VDI on my DFX ended up being an old pocket watch (my first nearly complete one)
At the second cellarhole down the closed road I had another upper 80's target and after digging a deep plug it was still in the hole. Spencer saw the edge and pulle it out proclaiming "Barber Quarter!"...man!...I gave a whoop (one of my still-to-find-list coins) and Bob came running. Spencer handed it to him and he announced "Canadian, but an oldie...it's a Vicki!"
Ended up being a 1872 Queen Victoria quarter in great shape!
Here's my finds and junk from Sat.
Spencer's bottles
We left a while after that and went home to see the Indians choke in Beantown (ouch).
Today Spencer and I went back with my dog and headed back to the spot where the Vicki was dug and started a short hunt.
Spencer tried to keep at it and dug quite a few targets looking for a decent find
My first decent sounding target (in the 60s) produced a square nail.
Rescanning the hole the sound was sweet (but broken) and the VDI now was in the 70s.
Another sq. nail from the hole and then...the VDI hit 80
Out popped a large corroded copper disk...my first LC. You can tell from the bust it's a Draped Bust Cent, but no date's visible at all....Still...my second oldest coin next to the 1792 Hibernia I found last year.
I also dug a bent up solid silver spoon, part of a pewter utensil and a few other doo dads.
Here's the finds from Sat and Sunday cleaned a bit
I'll attempt to get another permit...I am sure there's more there! (and there MANY cellarholes I haven't even tried yet.
Very satisfying weekend.
HH all!
As some of you may remember, I recently posted how I had received permission from the State to hunt some state-owned land that is normally verbotten to metal detecting. Old maps I found (1906) show over 30 homes on land that is now state property. Some of the roads are still is use, some closed and some are now part of a bridal trail system. My permission expired today (they only gave me a two week window) so...with this beautiful fall weather I wanted to make the most of it..so yesterday (Saturday) my son Spencer and I joined Bob (Mirage from TNet) for an all day hunt in the woods.
We planned on trying to check out seven cellar holes in an area of about 4 square miles. The first was right off the road and easily found. Right away we started hitting wheaties and I popped a 1954 Rosie early on to get the silver train rolling. Bob also scored some nice coins there (I'll let him post his finds so as to not spoil the fun) with one of his coins dating the spot to at least the turn of the century. These homes were all abandoned/bought out/demolished around 1960 from what I learned. Some research of mine (calls to the county's archivist who looked up some even older maps on microfilm for me) seemed to indicate that NONE of the homes would be any older than around 1870. Sooo...we expected to maybe find IHs and maybe even some Seated silver. Seeing as how a silver quarter older than a SLQ was one of the top on my list of "not found yets" I was full of hope.
The next spot we looked for was four cellarholes but required a long hike. I forgot my GPS but we had good sat.photos and old topo maps so we thought we could find them. Eventually we DID find some debris...sq. nails, old door hinge...bricks, but never really even found a depression or sign of a cellarhole.
Spencer in the meantime...grew bored with swinging the Ace250 (hey...he's 13 and needs constant coins to stay focused) so he went off on an adventure using a CO2 powered 6mm airsoft pistol. Dunno how many rounds he fired, but at one time I caught a glimpse of him with the pistol held up by his head doing his best Bond impression while trying to stalk a squirrel that was high up in the huge forrest canopy (don't worry folks...at that range and with a toy gun I doubt if he could do more that make a squirrel mad even if he did get a lucky shot in)..anyways...he was thouroughly amused and it kept him busy while we hunted.
We took a break for lunch and decided to hike out and hit two other cellarholes that were on a closed down roads right near where I parked. We kinda got lost and...using the sun's position ended up pointed kinda in the right direction again...and came out of the woods maybe 400 yds from where I parked the Element.
(BTW, I didn't take any pics of Saturday's adventure but Bob did...maybe he'll post some)
At the first of the two cellarholes again we hit wheats and then a GREAT high 80's VDI on my DFX ended up being an old pocket watch (my first nearly complete one)
At the second cellarhole down the closed road I had another upper 80's target and after digging a deep plug it was still in the hole. Spencer saw the edge and pulle it out proclaiming "Barber Quarter!"...man!...I gave a whoop (one of my still-to-find-list coins) and Bob came running. Spencer handed it to him and he announced "Canadian, but an oldie...it's a Vicki!"
Ended up being a 1872 Queen Victoria quarter in great shape!
Here's my finds and junk from Sat.
Spencer's bottles
We left a while after that and went home to see the Indians choke in Beantown (ouch).
Today Spencer and I went back with my dog and headed back to the spot where the Vicki was dug and started a short hunt.
Spencer tried to keep at it and dug quite a few targets looking for a decent find
My first decent sounding target (in the 60s) produced a square nail.
Rescanning the hole the sound was sweet (but broken) and the VDI now was in the 70s.
Another sq. nail from the hole and then...the VDI hit 80
Out popped a large corroded copper disk...my first LC. You can tell from the bust it's a Draped Bust Cent, but no date's visible at all....Still...my second oldest coin next to the 1792 Hibernia I found last year.
I also dug a bent up solid silver spoon, part of a pewter utensil and a few other doo dads.
Here's the finds from Sat and Sunday cleaned a bit
I'll attempt to get another permit...I am sure there's more there! (and there MANY cellarholes I haven't even tried yet.
Very satisfying weekend.
HH all!
Upvote
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(fantastic pics by the way)
Still cool to find. Tells you there could be some really old silver there.
