Metal Underground- The Movie

The Metal Underground from The Salt Institute on Vimeo.

Hunting With Matt Pollis

  Well, my friend and fellow dirt fisherman, Matthew Pollis seems to be well on his way to out-hunting me this year. His dedication and perseverance is truly impressive, and his finds are proof of the fact. We both work a great deal and finding time to get out there can be a challenge. At times we are limited to basically hunting in the rain or after dark, and sometimes in the rainy darkness. But that's ok. We got out in the rain last weekend and had a good hunt around an old cellar hole near Hosmer Pond, which is where most of the stuff I have pictured here came from. And the other night we started hitting a cellar hole in a downtown Camden field, which is as much an unlikely anomaly as it is a metal detecting paradise. Thanks to our mutual friend Donny, we have permission to do so and have been hitting it when we get the chance. This is the place where I found the amazing Maine militia button featured in the last post, and also the place that produced the fine buttons featured in the last two pics of this post, both found by Matt. There definitely seems to have been something of the military order taking place there during the Civil War, judging by the buttons. Matt has also found a few interesting pins or medals, which I do not yet have photos of, that bear clearly Masonic symbolism, which makes me suspect that there was some sort of Lodge there, too. I will try to get him to send me some so I can share them.

  Some of my favorite finds in this lot are the Victorian jewelry, the pocket watch compass, and. the 1800's copper compact with the mirror still unbroken. I also included the worst selfie ever, which I had to take as proof for someone that I had actually found that button and not just plucked the pic from the web. Haha.

 

Beach Bells and the Indian

  Back to the old beach again for a little more hunting. You know, until the ground thaws, it's really my only option. Ended up with five more battered wheaties and a 1905 Indian head, which was surprisingly in better shape than the wheats, and even better than most of the modern clad. Clad totaled out at 2.57 and a half. There was a 1939 Jefferson nickel, which I think was the second year of their production. There were a few interesting beach relics, including a nice copper lure spoon and a beautiful brass crotal bell, which happens to be on my list of favorite things to find. Also, a couple nice lead weights, a very old file, and some curious little odds and ends.

Finally!

At last, the ground has mostly thawed and I have been able to get out here and there in the past few days. Some of this loot was found under a large pier at low tide, but most came from a nineteenth century cellar hole in Union.
Came out with a few good coins: a 1920 Mercury dime and a gorgeous 1870 Canadian dime, a 5-cent token from the 1800's, a unidentifiably worn large cent, and four wheat pennies. There is quite a selection of trinkets, too: a beautiful floral pattern brass button and a highly decorative little copper ring (I love the copper rings), a few simple brass/copper coat buttons and three stone/porcelain buttons, four buckles, one of which is a really amazing hand-hammered brass belt buckle, a fancy little ribbon clasp, pipe-stem, mystery devices and extremely large "shotgun shell" casings, a pocket-knife, some nice pottery shards and glass jar lids. Whew! All in all, a pretty successful few days hunts, considering I can really only get out in the early morning or evenings.

The Indians of Mercury Cove

Went back down to the beach again at lunch yesterday and dug an Indian head penny on my first signal, not 12 inches from where the Merc was found. That's three coins off this beach and I am officially convinced it was heavily used in the early 1900's. I am also finding a lot of early 20th century shell casings and bullets. I guess they were down there shooting each other for pocket change. Anyway, the Indian turned out to be a 1908 and cleaned up rather well, leaving a fine green patina.

Mercury Rising

I have been working on a rooftop in Boothbay this week, putting some stone veneer on a chimney. The house is situated on this amazing point, flanked on either side by little coves, one of which is particularly sandy and inviting. I watched the tide go out all morning and I was thinking, wow, that cove looks just like a small boat landing. The home is located rather far out in the coastal williwags and there is no road leading down to the landing-cove anymore, but I had no trouble imagining some 19th Century lobsterman loading his boat up with wooden traps right there on that beach. Tide was lowest at lunch and I said to Damon, my business partner, "Let's get our food to go. I want to hit that beach for a few before we go back up on that roof."
I grabbed my machine and ran down the path to the water. After driving to the store, ordering food, paying, and driving back, there wasn't much time left for anything, but I was determined to get in at least a few moments. I swung the coil back and forth. Nothing. After a couple minutes, I thought that maybe this would be the first beach in Maine I had ever detected with not a bit of metal of any sort. Literally nothing, not even any muted "junk" signals from the E-trac. I checked to make sure it was on. Yep. Then a quiet, but solid signal in the 12 range, 12-30 or something. I suspected aluminum foil or a pull tab. However, out popped the first Mercury dime of the year! It's in rough shape, heavily weathered by the sea, so that I cannot even make out a date, but that's ok. There are more where that came from.

Beneath the Frozen Sands of Winter Beaches

I could not wait any longer. The battle against depression has driven me out to Maine's frozen beaches after dark. Obviously, the earth is frozen solid here until March, at the earliest, and I have been saying for weeks that the beach is the only thing that doesn't freeze. Well, I was wrong again. It was seven o'clock and as the temperature plunged toward the teens, the upper crust of the beach sand began to freeze. By eight, it had become impermeable and not even the razor-sharp tip of my Lesche digging tool would poke through.
However, in the one hour interim, I manages to pull out a few corroded wheaties, 1957 and 1954; and my first silver of the year, two badly tarnished Rosies, 1934 and 1946. Also, 32 cents in clad and a small unidentifiable copper (lower right coin in the 1st pic). Plus, there was this very cool old pocket-watch interior. It told me what time it was--it was time to pack it up and leave until the sun thaws out the sand. Beaches freeze, too.

Heavy Metal

Damon and I went for a walk on the beach during lunch the other day and came across these two enormous pieces of iron in the sand.  We were about a half-mile away, but could not resist the urge to carry them back to the truck.  This was an agonizing endeavor and probably hilarious to witness from the window of one of the many beachside homes, as the collective weight of the two objects was over 300 lbs. 

  Both pieces were really interesting and I almost took them home to put in the yard, but figured I probably had enough giant iron rusting in my yard as it is.  Besides, these things were heavy, and at the scrap yard, heavy means money.  12 cents a pound for number one iron, to be precise, which at over 300 lbs., is pushing 40 dollars.  It's a beggar's ransom, for sure, but money is money and we already had a load of metal anyway.  Honestly, I just need excuses to go to the scrap yard.

  I love that place.  It seems to be one of the last vestiges of lawlessness and chaos left around here. The other day, one of the workers was telling me how the excavator operator dug into an RV with his bucket and hit a full sewage tank, which exploded from the pressure of methane gas inside and spewed stinking human waste hundreds of feet in every direction.  "You should have seen it," he said, laughing and taking long drags off his cigarette. "This place smelled just like somebody's rotten a##hole all day long."  And he was right.  I should have seen it.  And I'm really sorry I didn't.

The Lamp Works

  Found inside the wall of a house under renovation in Rockland.  Actually, the house on Granite Street, where Damon and I tore the chimneys down a month or so ago.  This is a box that once held a small light bulb of the tungsten variety.

 

1873 Indian Head Penny

  Found this in a park in Rockport. It is one of the nicest Indians I have turned up yet. The soil in this particular park seems to have low acidity, as the the coins coming out have much less damage than those I find elsewhere.

1920's Pocket-Spill

  I paid a visit to a local park I have been wanting to check out and came up with a few items of interest: namely a beautiful Buffalo nickel with a fantastic patina (unfortunately no clear date), a 1912 Barber dime, a devastated 1880 Indian Head penny, two wheat pennies (still in the cleaning process), a nice 19th century buckle, and a pretty little bejeweled brooch from the 1800's. The Barber dime actually came out of the ground wedged between the two wheaties, the result of some unfortunate pocket-spill about a hundred years ago.

1904 Barber Dime

A brief stop in Union Common yielded yet another weathered Indian Head penny and a nice 1904 Barber dime. I suspect this park was hit heavily years ago and stripped of all its large silvers and coppers, which is why I seem to only find Indians, deep nickels, and Barber dimes. Not that I am complaining.