Posted 9 years ago
SpiritBear
(813 items)
Story first:
Many vines and thick, broad-leafed plants grew green all over in the humidity and mosquitoes.
Turning over some item (which I have forgotten what it was) let me discover the biggest slug I could never have imagined, and thus set me to promptly turn it back down away from my flying dirt.
My trench-shovel ate into the mound as it disappeared under me, and the metal head penetrated much broken glass over a period of two days where it found many items.
The area was almost a good one, in which broken insulators, bottle shards, silverware and, of course, at least one coin lay in several sections-- I'd later dig another dump in there. One section wound through trees like a river of glass glittering beneath filtered sunlight.
Later a young man and, I assume, his niece, stumbled upon me where I lay watching them-- for they had unknowingly disturbed my digging, and I had wished to remain undetected.
So I ate my granola bar and just stared at them till they soon backed away and left me in peace. (Sometimes people are scared of me, which can work in my favour. In this case, a dirty digger with shovel and God knows what else is kind of frightening, I'm sure, in the woods as he just stares at you.)
I dug that household dump last summer. The 1941 Walking Liberty Half Dollar would have been in very fine condition, had it not been used in a brick building like a shed or something-- probably mortared in as good luck, where it was also crushed. Apparently it wasn't lucky, as the dump ended in the 1960s-- AKA, the structure didn't last.
The coin also disappeared from my collection beside a few others. :(
But digging it did win me $5, if I recall, at the bottle club where one guy thought it was a Colonial piece. LOL.
Next we also have bottles after they were cleaned up and some highlighted. A few Orange Crush bottles from the 1920s portion of it, a couple later 1910s medicines at the bottom, and some other stuff from the '30s on.
A nice 1940s flask also popped up-- one of the few intact ones, and the only nice one worthy of bringing home.
Then the 'crier', as bottle-collectors would say: a beautiful crock shard. Such a tragic piece. But it's now used in my bottle garden.
The dump was set around 60 meters into the woods opposite a Victorian home on a dirt road. It was at the base of a hill and had a tree fallen over the top. In it was a very old log still preserved in the glass and rust and dirt-- too large to move, so I dug around the buried surprise.
![[Lot of 5] Walking Liberty Half Dollar - 90% Silver - Choose How Many Lots of 5!](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/FzwAAOSwnIxhLPiW/s-l225.jpg)
![[Lot of 10] Walking Liberty Half Dollar - 90% Silver Choose How Many Lots of 10!](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/kwcAAOSwywpkaVwC/s-l225.jpg)
I wish I could do that around here - I think it's fun. I had a metal detector years ago.
And here I wish I had a metal detector. LOL.
I read that there are metal detecting apps you can install on your cellphone, i haven't tried one yet. I enjoy reading about your adventures, Spirit. They inspired me to start doing this, too, however my digs will never come close to yours for a bunch of reasons. I had another disappointing day yesterday at a local farm. Turned out the dump was mid-century and all the good stuff was burned mercilessly. I walked away with a few coke/pepsi/fanta bottles. Another dump i was shown was from the 80's, at that point i was too frustrated and disappointed. I've been trying to find time to wash the bottles and post them. Maybe next weekend. Good stuff, keep posting.
I have no cell phone either. LOL.
I started out in a lake, Anna. Most bottle hunters shun those. My first bottle dump was 1950s-1960s in low-branching trees (I had to dig it with hand-trowels).
It was a full year and a half before I hit anything before 1920.
Two years after I began I finally found an 1800s site-- inside a building. xD
One dump stuck in my mind-- a industrial dump (sounds healthy, right?) Tons and tons of bottles-- lots of ACLs from the '60s: All burned and partially melted, crushed, etc. Ant nest in the mound, lots of hard rust and slag-metal and rock and plastic to dig in. I found it in the woods off a railroad that went along miles of factories. The best item in it was some sort of weight. I even found the remains to a French-Canadian ACL.
For a year and a half it was rare for me to find anything intact.
AKA, don't give up. Keep looking-- there are often multiple dumps; also look for wells. At worst you got good exercise!
Also, for dug ACLS: Let them dry for a month or two before cleaning. Use an old soft-bristle toothbrush on them. Else the ''paint'' (it's baked on to fuse to the glass) comes off.
No cellphone...extreme digging in the woods...am i missing something? LOL
Thanks for encouragement, i'll keep looking elsewhere, since that dump was not possible to even dig with a trench shovel...just huge rocks and prickly shrubs.
A month for ACL for drying?! wow, i thought a couple of days. Btw, meant to ask for a while, what brushes do you use for bottle cleaning? I can't seem to find a decent brush set, they all end with a metal tip which does nothing to a bottle except scratching its bottom.
I consider myself to be a fairly different person. LOL.
No problem, Anna. If there are so many bowlders and rocks, it is unlikely much has survived. As for thorns, thick denim is what I get through with.
Yep, a month (I've been recommended to wait two). You can probably try H2O2 (Hydrogen Peroxide) to help clean them, but I've never used anything but soap and water.
My brushes look just like these:
http://images.containerstore.com/catalogimages/83825/SoftTipBottleBrushes_l.jpg
Big white poofy thing at the end. I bend the tip a bit to clean the shoulders.
You can also try 1/3rd sand and 2/3rds soap-water shaking around.
Thanks for the info, Spirit.
You will still be a different person in this day and age with an old-fashioned analog phone, but maybe people in your life will be less worried about you.
No problem, Anna.
The last part I'll argue against. LOL.