6/5/04

    It sure felt good to get out digging again. We have been rained out the last two weeks. Anticipation wasn't very high. We had already dug the better pits from these yards. It was time to clean up some of the ones we left behind that didn't feel so good.

    The first pit contained a lot of glass. Mostly the bunk 1/2 pint whiskey flasks that are typical in this neighborhood. We did get our first intact hutch of the year. It is a Max Kantor Sanitary Bottling Works. Also, we got an applied crown Badger State Bottling, with a badger embossed on the bottle.

Badger bottle and Max Kantor hutch

Dig site pic

    The second pit was thin on glass and kind of newer. There was a red stripped perfume vial with the stopper and a Watkins Dandruff Remover and Scalp Tonic in a light shade of amber.

    I heard the sound of a mower about four houses down. We had dug behind the business and wanted to get in there again. Same story, we never found an old pit there. I walked over and talked to the guy. He said it was fine to dig again. The first time we were there, they were demolishing the garage to make way for a parking lot. The concrete slab is still there. I am sure there has to be a pit under it. The owner didn't care if we made holes in it. Bad news is that we had my truck and nothing to make these holes.

    I found a spot real close to the house. We got down a little and sure enough it was a stone liner. The bad news is that we were getting steel pop cans and plastic soda straws. We went down a little bit hoping it was just top fill. We probed it out and couldn't feel a layer change. We filled it in and went on to the next one.

    It was right along the property line, the roots were terrible. We made it down to the two foot level when the guys wife spots us in her back yard. She came out chastising us for being there. I told her her husband had given us permission. "I told him no, you guys finish that one and get out of here!"  Wow, I have never had that happen. I wish she would have just kicked us out, the hole was junk and we ended up with one Dr. Jaynes bottle for the anguish.

    I was tired and that kind of took the wind out of me a little. We drove around for a bit, I was ready to call it an early day. We decide to make one more pass through the neighborhood. We had a couple more pits in a neighbor's yard, who wasn't home. Just our luck, he just got there. 5 minutes later, we were again opening up some holes. The first one had some unembossed 1870s bottles. The second one we bailed on. It was full of slaggy pink ash and modern bottles.