12-31-05

   Steve met another local bottle collector and invited him along for a dig. Barna is no stranger to looking for glass, but this was to be his first privy dig.

   We decided to hit the same place as last week. We had found some older stuff in a cistern, but never did find the old pits. There were a couple funny feeling spots from last week that needed a second probing. We lifted up a huge piece of concrete to get at the pit better. Luckily this time it felt better and the dig was on.

    We actually came down on top of a pit and had a shallow bonus trash pit along side this one as well. Bits of broken yelloware and slick meds started popping up. 

    Barna was in the hole and had his first dug bottle on the run. A bit of coaxing and it was free. A Dr Dedemor/Chicago ILLS  Improved/Medicated/ Black Berry Brandy! Not bad for a first bottle!

Beginners Luck!

Dr. DeDemor/ Chicago ILLS

Improved Medicated/ Blackberry Brandy

    Steve got a nice seaweed patterned chamber pot on one of his turns.

These things are never intact

Never say Never

1894 Armand Marseilles bisque doll head

   We probed for a bit but could not find another pit. So, we headed for a couple of Barna's permissions. The first one looked very promising. An 1880s school house. The lot was huge but the guys found a couple spots. The bad news is there was a telephone pole right there. Along side of that a junction box with a 2" in diameter phone cable running into it underground. The devil on one shoulder was whispering "Dig it, Dig it" while the angel on the other side was pointing out the "Call before you dig" stickers on the pole and box. A decision was reached to hit it another day and get the phone company to locate the utilities.

    Next place was had a small yard. It and the house next to it looks like a neighboring business bought the backs of their lots and built on them. We did find a couple spots but they were pretty bunky containing lots of metal and screw top bottles.

    Next stop was Steve's brother-in-law. Steve and Jeff were here but could not find anything. The yard was long and my probe weary arms were aching. Steve found a spot in the corner right away and we started to dig. The pit contained a wide range of bottles. A quart A Bruner milk, J.J. Kolman hutch, Hurd drug stores, and a Bloxdorf and Klunder blob beer, and a 2"  white core latticinio marble. We also got a bit of a cultural lesson from Barna. Being pure blood Hungarian, we were schooled in the proper pronunciation of HUNYADI JANOS as found on the bottoms of Bitterquelle bottles. 

    The final pit of the day of the day was right next to this one and under a big tree. Roots were big and thick and fighting us on the way down. We spent a good amount of time taking turns trying to free a bottle that was engulfed by two different roots. We finally gave up and filled it in.