Well, me and my brothers went out metal detecting in our yard because we had nothing but else to do. Well, we went around the fireplace area, and the metal detector started going crazy over this one spot. So, we started digging. And after about 30 seconds, we had found something like 5 pennies using my pointer device. none were old. We even found many zinc ones. But we kept going for at least an hour until it was time to go inside for dinner. And we are still looking right now. Here's the damage: And here's the treasure:
Any chance its part of a water runoff path? A friend in the 1970's found a bunch of dimes and cents where water rushed down to a spot at a school. The theory was that lighter lost coins in heavy rains were washed down there and then settled where the water pooled.
Exciting find in your own yard, fer sure! Any broken glass in there with 'em? I guess the fun now is figuring out what they were doing there. Got a new machine coming in the mail today, can't wait to get out with it.
Definitely no running water. And we have owned the house since 2016. I think the newest is 1997 - the early 2000's. I'd have to look. All the dates were before we bought the house though. I know that.
I think someone put all of them there on purpose. Maybe the person who owned the house before us didn't want to keep pennies?
Possible. I have heard stories of some people stepping out of their car at a certain place every day and throw any pennies they got on the ground. Never made sense to me, why not just toss in a jar. At some point there would be at a minimum lunch money in that jar. Another possibility is kids playing with them as counters or part of a game simply lost them there. Its like the Army always loses cartridges on firing ranges. They only make you turn in 90% of the expected weight since they count on the privates not being able to find all the shells they shot in the grass.
Where I live I've got a median with trees out front of my house between the lanes of traffic in either direction where I walk my dog every day, about a year ago right by a tree we walked up on a few cents laying on the ground, and as I picked them up and scanned around there were $9.74 in pennies scattered around about a 5 foot area just laying on the surface took me about an hour to pick up. I guess someone just tossed their car ashtray full of a years woth of pennies out. Maybe it was a contractor or something in your case, had the truck out there to work on the roof or something, or paint the house and dumped his ashtray cents.
May I suggest something I use to do when actively MD-ing. I bought a used (small) rock tumbler for about $15 and used it to tumble clean clad 1¢, 5¢, 10¢ & quarters. I mixed cheap vinegar, salt & white sand along w/ the coins, then tumbling 1-2 hours usually did the trick. Note: Be sure and tumble the 1 cents by themselves, otherwise your other coins will come out copper colored. Never had anyone refuse to accept these 'cleaned' coins. J.T. Addendum: Of coarse you would do this ONLY w/ coins you intend on spending & not any that may be collectible.
Do you have Ravens in the area? They love shiny things and often collect and hide them, but all cents? Not likely but food for thought. LOL
Never heard of throwing away a perfectly good penny. When I was a kid 8 of them and an empty would get a bottle of soda. 19 of them would get a gallon of gas. 13 would get you in to the Saturday movies. I still bend over and pick them up.
I remember those days. For $.25 I could get a comic book, a fountain drink and a full sized candy bar and still get change back.