Sidewalk Treasures

  The more I do this, the more I am approached by friends and strangers who have their own treasure hunting stories, from mystery objects found beachcombing to accidental discoveries like the used car coin collection I posted last month. Yesterday, I ran into my good friend Ronald at the new Owl and Turtle Coffee Shop, and he pulled out a little tattered blue coin purse. He plopped it into my palm and I was immediately impressed by its unusual heaviness. "Years ago, I lived in New York City," he said in his thick Dutch accent. "One day I was walking down the street and I found this little change purse just sitting on the sidewalk beside a trash can." 

  Inside, I found about a dozen medium sized musket balls, two larger walnut sized grape shot or musket balls, and forty or so heavily worn pewter buttons that were obviously of military origin. Many of them bore numbers on their faces and I assumed from my own past finds that they were Civil War relics. However, after talking with my friend and co-worker, Mark Becker, who has a pretty expansive knowledge of that sort of thing, and doing a little research online, I have determined they are actually Revolutionary War artifacts. They are made of pewter, with rusty iron loops on the backs, and some were probably silver plated, with the numbers representing the regiments. 

  I cannot imagine what this little purse was doing on the sidewalks of NYC. Perhaps some desperate individual stole it thinking it was full of money and disposed of it just as quickly when he or she realized it was just filled with worthless lead balls and nasty broken buttons. Little did they know, they were actually tossing aside an incredible little collection of important relics dating back to America's war for independence. I would be excited to find any one of these buttons, never mind an entire sack of them. Once again, it proves that "treasure" can be found anywhere, at any time, as long as you keep your eyes open.

Success

  I have started to work my way around the Camden cellar hole and the western yard has started to produce some coins. First, an 1888 Indian Head Penny. Then, a fine 1807 large cent! The first large copper of the year, and the second came just moments later and a few feet away. I can't make out a readable date on this one, but judging by the design on the rear, it probably dates from the mid 1800's.  The large "Success" button turned out to be a knob from an early nineteenth century oil lamp, made by the P.L. & B. company. I then found a nice large musket ball, also a first of the year, I think. A couple of little rusty steel buttons, some cool Victorian jewelry, one of which had a bright red "stone" that faded somewhat during cleaning, a great large brass button with a checkerboard pattern, and a tiny little belt buckle, probably from a Leprechaun. I find a lot of Leprechaun buckles.

April Fool's

  I couldn't believe it, but we got slammed on April 1st by a Nor' Easter that produced about six inches of snow, heavy winds, dangerous roads, and power outages all over the state. Needless to say, I didn't get any MD time in on Friday. However, Saturday morning I went down to Camden Harbor and had a little time before the tide came in. Turned up the usual sack of pennies from the wishing well upstream (see my post from last month about the wishing well), another great old fishing weight to add to my fishing weight collection, some kind of unidentifiable brass thingy with the letters F and S on it (maybe "fast" and "slow" as suggested by my friend Dave Curry), a great old brass faucet (probably from a ship), and a musket ball or bearing or dangerous metal man-marble. I can't wait for unfrozen ground that is not covered in snow...