Options
I got out for an hour today, the first I have been
millennium
Posts: 3,305
in a long time. I searched a local park here on the island, and found mostly new stuff, but did manage a silver quarter that was near an old tree at the south end of the park..It has been a while since I have been, and to find silver, is just exhilarating!
0
Comments
Wasn't at Neptune, by any chance, was it?
If by the "south end" of the park you mean Neptune Park, would it be that old cedar tree next to where the putt-putt course used to be? I dug some Merc dimes and stuff there years ago but it's like pulltab-a-looza in there. Matter o' fact, the cheapish Bounty Hunter I used to own outperformed my old Garrett GTA-500 in there.
One wonders what the shooting is like in there since they totally redid the park. I know they put in sod.
<< <i>but if that quarter was there this area hasn't been hunted that much. >>
I've zigzagged over most of it, but it's a big area, and I don't pretend for a moment to have covered every square yard of it, let alone square foot. There are a lot of gaps in my coverage of that area because I focused more on the northern bluff in the past.
Y'know, in the southern park area of the Bluff, I've never gotten any silver. A stray Wheatie or two and a Buffalo nickel, once, but all of my good Gascoigne finds (including the War of 1812 US Light Dragoons beltplate which was my most valuable find to date), came up on the more northern end of the bluff near the Cassina Garden Club houses. (The old Hamilton Plantation slave cabins- which reminds me- I have a sigline picture of those I use occasionally- I need to put it on for a while). I don't think they're so keen about people detecting in that area now, but back in the 1990s it was pretty much my exclusive hunting ground, all to myself. I gave some of the garden club ladies some relics, which for all I know are still on display in one of those cabins.
Even further north, on the Epworth side of the bluff, just past that white picket fence, is "the Half Dime Lawn". I brought a visiting detectorist there once (had permission from Rev. Rush, the superintendent, himself a detectorist), and my visitor dug an 1857-O half dime in the azaleas by the fence. I later found my first Seated half dime in that lawn. It was an 1854, holed and bent double- I thought it was a pulltab tongue at first. I managed to straighten it out by hammering it between a couple of wood blocks. Later found a 1944 Walker half in that same lawn.
Speaking of the southern part of the bluff, where you were (closer to the Causeway and Demere Road, yes?), I did find a cool old aluminum $1.00 Eagle Tailoring Company token from Jacksonville, probably turn of the century. And when they bulldozed that area for the parking lot where the restrooms are for the new fishing pier, I found a really nice spun-back flat button from the late 1700s. Pristine. I thought it was a nickel when it came up. Very shallow.
Seeing you southern guys being able to get out and hunt this time of year always drives me a bit crazy.
Bad enough that come the end of February folks up north are starting to get the winter blues, but to know you guys can head out and dectect really leaves me pining for spring.
I'm happy for you, silver and a key.....for an MD'er that's a decent day!
HH
JC
Charles III Album
Charles III Portrait Set
Charles IV Album
Charles IV Portrait Set
I've dug plenty of early musketballs and big .69 caliber Civil War minies and buttons of all kinds out there, too, though mostly on the northern (slave cabin & Epworth) part of the bluff.
You've inspired me to wear my Gascoigne Bluff/Hamilton Plantation Slave Cabins sigline picture, as you can see: