2/9/21 Report - Factors To Consider Before Detecting. Old Bottles. It Wasn't The Vikings.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of the Treasure Beaches Report.

Recent Find.

Sunday I went for a little bottle hunt.  The broken bottle shown above is the kind of thing I was looking for if it wasn't broken.  Too bad!  Still glad to see it. 

It is a straight-side Coca Cola bottle, that without doing a lot of research to really nail it down, I would guess dates to 1913 - 1917.  You can see the beautiful script Coca Cola trade mark on two sides of the bottle. 

On the same walk I found the bottle shown below, which is in better shape but not worth much of anything.  I still like the cork in it.  

Barnett's Standard Flavoring Extract Bottle
With Most of Original Cork.

Yesterday I talked about finding old gold coins by hunting modern jewelry, and the day before that I talked about things you can do to find old stuff when your favorite Treasure Coast wreck beaches aren't producing.  I didn't spell it out in so many words, but hunting modern jewelry is one way you can find old treasure coins when you are having trouble finding them on the wreck beaches.  It really helps to know where to search.

Things aren't distributed randomly.  It is important to remember that.  No matter what you are hunting, some locations are much better than others for producing that particular type of item.  By using your knowledge you can dramatically improve the probability of success, no matter how you define that.

Take the Coca Cola bottle shown above.  It is not surprising that it was found in front of an area where there was once an old hotel in the 1910s.  Even though the bottle is broken, it still tells you can find some pretty old things in that area.

I'm not going to spell out the several specific factors for finding good old coin jewelry, but I'll give you a few clues.  

I'll switch the type of target for a minute just for purposes of illustration. Let's say you were looking for championship sports rings, where would you go?  You might find one almost anywhere, but there are some places where your chances are much better.  

Back a couple decades ago, there was a resort in North Dade that hosted a TV show in which sports stars competed in various games on the beach and in the water.  Championship rings from a variety of  sports were found there.  Young active competitive sports stars were brought to a location where they stayed, played and competed on the beach and in the water.  

That beach in more recent years was extended way out into the water far east of where it was in those days.  The condition of the beach is always important.

Now back to the coin jewelry.  Where would you have the best chance of finding it?  Consider the type of people who visit an area.  Consider the type of people that buy and freely wear that type of thing and how they behave.  Is there a local establishment that sells that type of thing.  Where would it more likely be worn and lost?  Think about all of those things.

The first and most important thing to remember is that target distribution isn't random.  You can easily understand why more University of Miami rings are found in South Dade and why Broward High School rings are so frequently found at Hollywood Beach.  

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If you like old Coca Cola bottles as much as I do, you'll find this site very helpful for dating old Coke bottles.  It is excellent.

DatingEarlyCocaColaBottles.pdf (fohbc.org)

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Pre-European Beads and Copper Items Found in Alaska

Source: See link below.

European-crafted glass beads found at three different indigenous sites in northern Alaska date back to the pre-colonial period of North America, in what is an intriguing archaeological discovery.

Somehow, these blueberry-sized beads made their way from what is now Venice, Italy, to the Brooks Range mountains of Alaska at some point during the mid-to-late 15th century, according to new research published in American Antiquity.

The authors of the paper, archaeologists Michael Kunz from the University of Alaska Museum of the North and Robin Mills from the Bureau of Land Management, suspect the beads were trade goods that, after passing through China’s Silk Road, eventually made their way through Siberia and eventually into Alaska via the Bering Strait. If confirmed, it would be “the first documented instance of the presence of indubitable European materials in prehistoric sites in the Western Hemisphere as the result of overland transport across the Eurasian continent,” the authors wrote in their study...

Here is the link.

Found in Alaska, These Blue Beads Could Be the Oldest Evidence of European Goods in North America (gizmodo.com)

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The surf is up just a little today.  It is something like three or four feet, and will be going back down for the remainder of the week.

It might look bad for our country right now, but I gotta feelin something good is going to happen.

Happy hunting,

TreasureGuide@comcast.net