614 hunt

[Lowbatts]

Yesterday Mayo, Dan and I hit up some old woods near here. There's a couple bottle dumps, an old workshop (long gone) a sledding hill, skating pond of old, etc.. back in this tiny forgotten place. I'd found silver there over the last several years on the few hunts I'd done there and gotten some nice digs from the dumps but knew I was far from cleaning it out.

Not to be outdone, I took on Mayo in a game of finding newer coinage in an older site and we forced Dan to settle for chasing the oldies. He did good, but I got half a dozen mem cents from ancient dirt in between rocks and on end! Ha!

Got some old junk too. Two Orient coal tags. The Orient Coal mine in Illinois was famous for a 1951 tragedy, it appears. Somewhere around 200 miners lost their lives there with one sole survivor in a Christmas holiday explosion.

Another silver ring, and a formerly fine looking pen also came forth from the dirt for me. Pulled out a little more than a half dozen fine looking bottles, an old aqua beer applied mouth, a nice Chicago Fancy whiskey and a large flare-lip prescription went home with Mayo, Dan got a gorgeous half gallon mason with lid and contents intact under a 100 years of rust and trash! Hay Mayo I'm pretty sure this pic from the 1904 catalog fits that whiskey bottle. They were kind of pricey back then!

 

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[twistidd]

Tim,

Cool finds. I'm itching to head out your way for some coin hunting. Maybe this coming weekend, if you're heading out locally, I can swing by. I'd love to check out the old sledding hill, I need an old coin fix. However, if it's exceptionally warm out and the Excal is charged, I'm a beach bum.

Joe

 

[Lowbatts]

Anytime Joe, just say the word and we'll hit the woods.

We did run into the local madman in the woods there yesterday, he's the self-described "last redskin in the valley" and he usually carries one of the old axes he found in the dump area there around whacking trees at will. He did tell me yesterday he was about to "put your happy-a$$ to work" pulling ten acres of buckthorn undergrowth....

Ah the wildlife beckons.

 

[Mayo South Elgin]

Well my coinage was a 1973, 1977, and 1986D Mem cents... the whiskey bottle I didn't find - Tim or Dan did but I found the other bottle pictured here which may be listerine or something similar. They are both clear glass - my tablecloth makes them look like they are glass of color.

There were actually at least four golfballs - I only took one as a souvenir and left the others in the woods to multiply on the full moon like they usually do.

The knife isn't as big as the behemoth I found while on last years BBQ/hunt, but it was quite a bit more dangerous since the blade was open when I found it. The behemoth had no blade.

I think my favorite find is the lions head drawer pull. It might be a door knocker but judging from the size it's more likely a drawer pull or something from a steamer trunk or chest. I know there's a joke here about chests and knockers but anyways...

Of course the couple obligatory shotgun brass casings, barbed wire, etc and not pictured (went into the trash) were the two mason jar lids with glass inserts, and the chrome volume knob from a boom box, and the strangely out of place stainless steel cable connector.

 

[kimsdad]

Nice digs, Tim!!!

That Orient tag is outtasight! What the heck is it doing way up here?

My mom is from Orient, IL, and there were two Orient mines, Orient 1 was in the town of Orient, and Orient 2 was in West Frankfort, the nearby big city to Orient. My grandfather and great grandfather worked Orient 1, and I'm sure I had other relatives that did, to. My mom talks about the explosion in Orient 2, and what was referred to as "black Christmas" for all the death and sadness.

I don't think Orient 1 was ever operated under the name "Orient Coal", though. That distinction went to Orient 2, I believe, though at the time of the explosion, it was owned by the Chicago, Wilmington & Franklin Coal Co. My grandmother's house was a few hundred feet from the mine complex, and as a kid, I used to play around the ruins of the old brick buildings, including the payhouse building. Too bad I didn't have a good detector back then!

Here's a link to more info on the disaster:
http://www.evansville.net/user/boneyard/orient.htm

Sorry to ramble, but it's not every day that the name of my mom's hometown shows up on a T-Net find!

 

[Lowbatts]

Mayo's got a nice knocker....

Hey Neil, here's a shot of one of those tags that cleaned up for your sentimental side. These two tags did seem out of place here, I've found others but always in yards, usually near the coal chutes along the driveway, go figure!

Now if we can a pic or two of Dan's near-banner dig....

 

[mikewaz]

Nice going guys!
Relics, coins, tokens and bottles..... What a day!
Mike