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Message:: [QUOTE="lordmarcovan, post: 2590697, member: 10461"]December, 2016: another dusting off and reposting of a Collectors Universe oldie.  I'm trying to salvage as many of my old dig stories as I can, though some are irretrievably lost. DIGS O' THE DAY (2008-02-28): RETURN TO HAGEY HOUSE: THE SEQUEL Most of February passed me by without a detector outing. Thursday, February 28th dawned cold and frosty- our lawn was white and the birdbath frozen. This seemed odd, considering we'd been running the air conditioning only two days before. But Mother Nature often has such mood swings in southeast Georgia, around the change of seasons. She can't seem to make up her mind, sometimes. Fortunately, it warmed up into a nice mild day, sunny and cloudless, and I was out the door at 1:00 PM. I decided to try a return visit to the Hagey residence on Union Street in Old Town Brunswick. They'd let me hunt there on January 27th, which had been my last outing. As I started the car, the radio came on, and the song that was playing was Emerson, Lake, and Palmer's "Lucky Man". An auspicious title, perhaps. As long as one doesn't listen too carefully to the lyrics. I arrived to the surprising sight of giant dirt piles all over the front yard. Mr. Hagey was working outside, and welcomed me back graciously. He explained that the dirt piles were being built up into landscaping berms. I didn't need to worry so much about the lawn this time, since most of it was soon to be covered in fill dirt anyway. This would possibly be the last opportunity to detect some of it before it got re-landscaped. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28a-dirtpiles.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> On my last visit, I'd found a little lead toy Indian from the 1930s or 1940s. As it happens, this won the "Best Relic" award on one of the Internet forums I frequent. (Obviously, it had been a slow month there). Somebody told me I should go out and find the cowboy that went with the Indian in that old playset, but the spot where I'd dug the Indian was now underneath a four foot high dirt mound. As it happens, I did find some more lead in the yard on this visit, but not in quite as interesting a form. I started in the side yard, where I'd found a 1944-P silver War nickel and a 1944 Mercury dime on my last visit, not to mention a few old Wheat cents from around the same period, when the occupants of the house apparently were involved with the USO during World War II. The first signal of the day was a solid coin-range signal, four or five inches down, which seemed promising. It turned out to be a 1944 Wheat cent, which had suffered a strange cut to one edge, perhaps from being run over by a lawnmower. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28b-1944-Wheatie.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> It was followed by a more modern Memorial cent, which was one of several I found on this particular afternoon. I also found a small lead blob and another big lead sinker. On my previous visit, I'd found three large lead sinkers the size and shape of bird's eggs. These were probably net sinkers. Today's sinker was different- it was just as heavy, but triangular in shape. It was becoming pretty obvious that fishermen or shrimpers once occupied the house, which isn't really that surprising in our coastal town. I scanned a small backyard area I'd left totally untouched the last time, but it proved to be disappointing, despite the presence of two giant, centuries-old live oak trees. There were lots of loud signals that drove the detector crazy back there- I suspect there were buried cables or sprinkler lines or something. Near one of the big trees I dug a long .22 caliber shell that looked like it might have been a blank cartridge. Then, in the front yard, I found an old leather rivet. This is the one artifact I've found on the site that might date to the 19th century, though the house is slightly newer than that. (It is, however, surrounded by 19th century houses.) I have found rivets just like this on Civil War-era sites. This doesn't mean much, though- they could have made the same kind of rivet for decades. Some surprisingly deep pulltabs came up, and played hard to get, just to add to my frustration. Then, finally, another Wheat cent... yet another 1944! With two of the silver coins of the last visit dating 1944, and now two Wheat cents on this outing also dating to that year, it was getting to be an odd coincidence. Or perhaps not, since the US Mint was quite active that year, and produced a lot of coins. My mother was born in 1944, so that makes it a good year as far as I'm concerned. I dug more pulltabs and modern cents, and as I entered my third hour of detecting, I felt my energy waning and my legs and back tiring. I was beginning to get a sinking feeling that today was going to be a disappointment. Initially, I had placed my odds of getting silver today at better than 50 percent, but none had shown up yet, and it was becoming obvious I would not have a triple silver day like I'd had the last time. As I began to wind it up and head back to the car, I got a signal in the side yard, quite near where I'd found the first 1944 Wheat cent this afternoon, and only a few feet from where I had dug the 1944 Mercury dime on the visit before. This signal was almost identical to the one that had produced that 1944 dime, and only a few feet away from the spot. I dug and dug, having difficulty pinpointnig the target, but finally I got a loud signal in the loose dirt at the edge of the hole. It was up! I couldn't see anything at first. Then I noticed the reeded edge of a coin peeking out of the sand. It was plainly the edge of a silver dime! <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28c-peekaboo-Merc.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> Yes! Another Mercury dime! I will never, ever tire of finding these. Though I have dug more than sixty of them as of this writing, they still give me a thrill. I do love them. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28d-Merc-in-hand.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> So the day was a modest success, after all. I got a February outing, and I got "silvered". Mission accomplished. I found a little bit of junk, but not too much. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28e-junk.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> The total haul in coins was fourteen coins with forty-one cents face value. There were eleven modern coins: nine Memorial cents and two clad dimes. Then the three older coins: two 1944 Wheat cents and the Mercury dime. Guess what the date was on the Mercury dime? Yep- you guessed it: 1944! All three of my older coins today were from 1944, as were two of my three silver coins on the previous visit. One odd thing I noticed (beside the date 1944 coming up constantly) is that one of the Memorial cents I dug has an almost identical edge cut on it as the damaged 1944 cent that was my first find today. Strange. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28f-coins.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> When I got it home and rinsed it off, today's 1944 dime proved to be a nice one, in relatively high grade. 1944 is a common date and this is the fourth one I have found, but it adds to my silver count: I now have dug 64 Mercury dimes and a total of 189 silver coins. This one only needed a gentle soap and water rinse to regain its shine. <img src="http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/lordmarcovan/Diggers%20Diary/2008-02-28g-1944-Merc-scan.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> So I'm happy to report that February wasn't a total strikeout, after all. ~RWS [/QUOTE]

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