jasonbo
Sr. Member
OXFORD, Conn. -- Jerry Burr calls it a contest of "the quick and the deadly." The winners "move fast and don't waste time."
And with the title of world's fastest metal detector on the line, this year's championship is shaping up to be fierce.
Burr, an Oxford resident and president and founder of the National Metal Detecting League, is organizing an event known as the Cash Bash for the sixth year.
It takes place in October in Woodbury. He's already spoken to people with Guinness World Records, who have agreed to create a new category for whoever wins this year's championship.
Competitive metal detecting works like this: A football-sized field is planted with special tokens. Contestants have half an hour to find and dig up as many as possible. And they must follow strict rules: Only one person per detector; the coil and trowel must be regulation size; and contestants may not leave the field during or after the hunt until a judge has counted their finds.
The hunter with the most tokens at the Cash Bash wins a trophy, a chest of silver coins, a top-of-the-line metal detector and a world record.
The competition can be intense. Burr said he has to mark the tokens with a special insignia to thwart would-be cheaters.
"So people don't slip in dimes," he said.
He expects about 200 people this year from 15 states, including Colorado and Washington. After a qualifying round, the best four from each state move on to the championship hunt.
It's been eight years since Burr bought a metal detector from a friend.
"I didn't think it would work," he said. But then he took it out for a spin one weekend and "I dug up a whole bunch of coins ... I can't believe people lose so much."
Burr spends most of his hunting time around old foundations, looking for bits of colonial history such as buckles worn on the shoes of the original pilgrims. He has two. One, especially rare, has all its teeth and its moving parts still work.
His collection also includes pins, badges, buttons, thimbles, wedding bands, Civil and Revolutionary war bullets, tin soldiers, toy guns and, of course, coins of every size, denomination, year and nationality.
He's traveled to Virginia in search of Civil War memorabilia and has gone as far as England and Norway with one of his 10 metal detectors.
His active role in the metal-detecting world earned him an induction this April into the Treasure Hunter's Hall of Fame. He belongs to four metal-detecting clubs and goes on hunts about once a week.
Aside from a gold necklace and diamond ring which his wife, Laura, wears, he said he doesn't find much gold because he doesn't hunt at the beach. Instead, he sticks to farms and woods, looking for trinkets lost by some of the first Americans.
http://www.wfsb.com/Global/story.asp?S=5038186
And with the title of world's fastest metal detector on the line, this year's championship is shaping up to be fierce.
Burr, an Oxford resident and president and founder of the National Metal Detecting League, is organizing an event known as the Cash Bash for the sixth year.
It takes place in October in Woodbury. He's already spoken to people with Guinness World Records, who have agreed to create a new category for whoever wins this year's championship.
Competitive metal detecting works like this: A football-sized field is planted with special tokens. Contestants have half an hour to find and dig up as many as possible. And they must follow strict rules: Only one person per detector; the coil and trowel must be regulation size; and contestants may not leave the field during or after the hunt until a judge has counted their finds.
The hunter with the most tokens at the Cash Bash wins a trophy, a chest of silver coins, a top-of-the-line metal detector and a world record.
The competition can be intense. Burr said he has to mark the tokens with a special insignia to thwart would-be cheaters.
"So people don't slip in dimes," he said.
He expects about 200 people this year from 15 states, including Colorado and Washington. After a qualifying round, the best four from each state move on to the championship hunt.
It's been eight years since Burr bought a metal detector from a friend.
"I didn't think it would work," he said. But then he took it out for a spin one weekend and "I dug up a whole bunch of coins ... I can't believe people lose so much."
Burr spends most of his hunting time around old foundations, looking for bits of colonial history such as buckles worn on the shoes of the original pilgrims. He has two. One, especially rare, has all its teeth and its moving parts still work.
His collection also includes pins, badges, buttons, thimbles, wedding bands, Civil and Revolutionary war bullets, tin soldiers, toy guns and, of course, coins of every size, denomination, year and nationality.
He's traveled to Virginia in search of Civil War memorabilia and has gone as far as England and Norway with one of his 10 metal detectors.
His active role in the metal-detecting world earned him an induction this April into the Treasure Hunter's Hall of Fame. He belongs to four metal-detecting clubs and goes on hunts about once a week.
Aside from a gold necklace and diamond ring which his wife, Laura, wears, he said he doesn't find much gold because he doesn't hunt at the beach. Instead, he sticks to farms and woods, looking for trinkets lost by some of the first Americans.
http://www.wfsb.com/Global/story.asp?S=5038186
