4/6/20 Report - Great Finds. Thousand Year Old Atlatl Point. Lead Railroad Seal. Making History Every Day.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

1000 - 4000 Year-Old Atlatl Point Found on Treasure Coast Beach.

Find and Photo by Doug R.

Here is one super find that could be up to four thousand years old!  It was found by Doug R., who sent me the following message.

I’m a snowbird from CT and have come down to Sebastian for the month of February for the last 15 years. I do a little bit of metal detecting but not so much the past few years as conditions haven’t been that great. I’ve never found anything Spanish on the Treasure Coast (even that really good Saturday this year). I read your blog every day while I’m there and often when I’m not. I appreciate the work, time and effort that you put into doing the blog. It is truly outstanding. The first week of February I found this point on the beach about halfway between Wabasso Beach and Golden Sands. It was in a shell line that was 1-2 feet wide. At the time they were doing beach renourishment at that spot but the water had not reached that area at the base of the dunes yet so I’m pretty sure it didn’t come from this years renourishment sand. Could have come from previous years renourishment or the ocean?? I showed it to the guy at McClarty’s and he was extremely excited. He said it’s an atlatl point from one to four thousand years ago. It’s 4 inches long. I believe you’ve always said something to the effect “keep your eyes open at all times” so this proves your point. I never expected this.

Thanks again,

Doug R.

Congratulations Doug!  Thanks for sharing.

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Open St. Johns County beach (top) and a closed Duval County beach (bottom) on March 29.

Source:  Click here.

Now, of course, St. Johns County beaches are closed too.

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Lead Railroad Seal Find.

Photo submitted by Al C.

Al's buddy found this lead railroad seal.  Very cool!

Al also sent the following information about lead seals.

Thanks Al.

I've found some FEC seals.  Here is link to a post that shows some of those.

https://treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com/2012/09/92912-report-florida-east-coast.html

And here is a photo of the same.

Four Lead Railroad Seal Finds.

My photography wasn't as good back then.

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Most detectorists are interested in history.  We study history, but we live and create it everyday.

Yesterday I was most struck by the Palm Sunday services at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York being conducted without a congregation.  I don't know if that was the first time that happened since it opened 140 years ago, but it felt like it could have been.

There are events such as World Wars and pandemics that change the way that generations see the world. such as World Wars and pandemics.  In more recent history it was the 9/11 attacks.  In the 1960s it was the Cuban missile crisis.  You can't read a social psychology textbook without reading about JFK and the decision making process during that crisis.  It popularized the concept of groupthink.  Many people in the U.S. built bomb-shelters.  My own father built a concrete block room in our basement.

The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, the deadliest in history, infected an estimated 500 million people worldwide—about one-third of the planet’s population—and killed an estimated 20 million to 50 million victims, including some 675,000 Americans. The 1918 flu was first observed in Europe, the United States and parts of Asia before swiftly spreading around the world. At the time, there were no effective drugs or vaccines to treat this killer flu strain. Citizens were ordered to wear masks, schools, theaters and businesses were shuttered and bodies piled up in makeshift morgues before the virus ended its deadly global march...

With no cure for the flu, many doctors prescribed medication that they felt would alleviate symptoms… including aspirin which had been trademarked by Bayer in 1899—a patent that expired in 1917, meaning new companies were able to produce the drug during the Spanish Flu epidemic.

Before the spike in deaths attributed to the Spanish Flu in 1918, the U.S. Surgeon General, Navy and the Journal of the American Medical Association had all recommended the use of aspirin. Medical professionals advised patients to take up to 30 grams per day, a dose now known to be toxic...  
(https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/1918-flu-pandemic)

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The lawn service showed up at my neighbors house this morning and started mowing.  Essential service?  No!  Are they safe distancing?  No.  Big problem?  No.  Better to allow them to keep themselves financially afloat?  Probably.   That's my opinion.

All men are created equal, but some are not essential?  I saw the phrase "non-essential individuals" in one government order.  Essential to who?  I just don't like the phrase.  Seems like a very slippery slope that can end up in a very bad place.  You don't have to go back far in history to see where that can lead.

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The surf is supposed to be seven feet or so today.

Too bad so many beaches are closed.  Nice and rainy too.

Have a blessed Holy Week,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net.

1/29/20 Report - Spikes Found. Diving Neanderthals. Columbus and Caribs. Searchable Database.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Spikes Found Early Last Week.

Here are some spikes I found last week.

Shipwreck spikes?   Nope.

They are railroad spikes.s

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Neanderthals went diving for shells to turn into tools, according to new research, suggesting our big-browed cousins made more use of the sea than previously thought.

The study focuses on 171 shell tools that were found in a now inaccessible coastal cave in central Italy, known as the Grotta dei Moscerini, which was excavated in 1949. Dating of animal teeth found within layers alongside the shell tools suggest they are from about 90,000 to 100,000 years ago – a time when only Neanderthals are thought to have been present in western Europe.

The tools had previously been thought to have been formed from shells collected by Neanderthals from the beach where they had been tossed by waves. But now experts have peered at the shell tools through microscopes, revealing many do not show the wear and tear that would be expected from such a fate, such as the presence of barnacles or marks on the shells...

Here is the link for more of that article.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/jan/15/neanderthals-dived-for-shells-to-make-tools-research-suggests

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Christopher Columbus’ accounts of the Caribbean include harrowing descriptions of fierce raiders who abducted women and cannibalized men – stories long dismissed as myths.

But a new study suggests Columbus may have been telling the truth.

Using the equivalent of facial recognition technology, researchers analyzed the skulls of early Caribbean inhabitants, uncovering relationships between people groups and upending longstanding hypotheses about how the islands were first colonized.

One surprising finding was that the Caribs, marauders from South America and rumored cannibals, invaded Jamaica, Hispaniola and the Bahamas, overturning half a century of assumptions that they never made it farther north than Guadeloupe.

“I’ve spent years trying to prove Columbus wrong when he was right: There were Caribs in the northern Caribbean when he arrived,” said William Keagan, Florida Museum of Natural History curator of Caribbean archaeology.  “We’re going to have to reinterpret everything we thought we knew.”

Here is the link for more about that.

https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/science/carib-skulls-boost-credibility-of-columbus-cannibal-claims/

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I started talking about Kang Hsi porcelain and other pottery and then got off on some other things, but you might find the following web site helpful if you pick up shards.

It is the Florida Museum of Natural History pottery database.

https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/flarch/blog/new-searchable-guide-to-florida-pottery/

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I thought that blog Followers might get notice of new posts, but someone said he didn't think so. 

I have some topics that I need to address, but they'll have to wait until some other time because they are fairly complex and it will take me a while to get them put together.

For now,
Happy hunting,
Treasureguide@comcast.net

12/11/14 Report - A Variety of Really Nice Recent Land Finds. Take A Look.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.BlogSpot.com.



Find and Photo by Dan B.

Here is a cool find by Dan B.  It is an antique toy Texaco railroad tank car. 

It has several things going for it as a collectible.  It would be of interest to old toy collectors, railroad enthusiasts and those interested in petroliana. 

That wasn't all Dan found, but it is one of my favorites.


Here are some more of Dan's finds at the site.

Miscellaneous Finds by Dan B.

Here is a photo of some of Dan's finds.  Notice the toy tank car near the brown bottle at the top left.

Also, there are a couple of embossed pepsin syrup bottles.

Some of the small metal objects look interesting too.

Here is one of those.   

Find and Photo by Michael E.

Michael E. has been doing a lot of land hunting around the Treasure Coast area and making a lot  lot of interesting finds.   Here are some that he listed -  1909 wheat non Vdb, 1905 Indian, a dozen smaller buckles and suspender clips, shield fob with the outline of where a swastika was attached. 1932 Washington hatchet stick pin, amid some other brooch and hat decor.  Concerning a backyard hunt by he and William M., Micheal said, it seems like we dug hundreds of bullets. William recovered a 1902 Indian, and I recovered a version 2, currently unable to see date shield nickel.

To the left is one of those finds.  Very nice.  Congratulations Michael!

And below is a FOB with the imprint of a swastika.  Again, very nice find Michael.  Congratulations! 

I wanted to show some of the older things that people have been digging around the Treasure Coast.  I planned on posting some of these earlier but had to show the big waves yesterday.

Find and Photo by Michael E.

Happy hunting,
Treasureguide@comcast.net

4/14/14 Report - Sanford Railroad History, The Copper Freight Tag, Flue Thimbles, Poll Results & What Really Matters

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.


Here is what James F. has been able to learn after researching his copper railroad freight tag that I showed in my 4/9/14 post.

Well, I've been researching the old copper freight tag and have found some interesting information concerning it. It is a freight tag from the original South Florida Rail Road Company which was established in Sanford, Florida in 1879, built in 1880 and run from Sanford to Orlando from 1880 thru 1886 before becoming, in 1887, the "Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West Line," until becoming the "Plant Line" from 1889 until 1905, then the Atlantic Coast Line until from 1905 until 1969 then finally CSX, the current Florida railroad. So the tag can be dated somewhere between 1880 and 1886. The tag itself denotes a shipment of perhaps 127  "8 IN FLUE THIMBLES" which is the piece of hardware used in a building that is fixed to the inside to allow the smoke or stove exhaust to exit to to the outside. An interesting look at life 128 to 134 years ago :-)

Jim made a great historical find and made it all the more significant and interesting by doing the research.  Thanks James, and congratulations!

Below is a picture showing a flue thimble. This one shown below is for a wood burning stove.

Source:http://www.woodstove-outlet.com/woodstove/Insulated-Thimble-Wall-Pass-Though.htm

That would be an important piece of hardware back then.

This picture from the Florida Memory Project shows the scene in 1886. 

And here is a paragraph from the Florida Memory Project.

1886:  Rail Service Reaches Central Florida Rail service was completed between Jacksonville and the central Florida town of Sanford, on Lake Monroe. Although steamboat travel was just reaching a pinnacle of popularity, with seventy-four vessels running out of Jacksonville, the penetration of railroads into central Florida spelled the beginning of the end for the steamboat era.

Here is the link, which provides a nice time line of significant historical developments.

http://www.theriverreturns.org/explore/history/text/19/


I made a good many mistakes in yesterday's post.  I must of been half asleep or something.  Anyhow, I think I got them corrected.

For one thing I said that the second most frequently selected topic in the poll was Treasure Coast beach conditions, and that is correct.  However, I said that it got 15% of the votes, which is wrong.  It got 24%.

So the two most frequently selected "favorite" topics were Treasure Coast finds (36%) and T. C. beach conditions (24%).

Next in order was historical and archaeological information (15%), followed closely by beach dynamics (12%).

Both of those will help you be more successful.  For me, beach dynamics is a very important topic.  If you learn to understand a beach, you can really improve your time efficiency by quickly identifying and spending your time on the most productive areas.

Detecting and recovery techniques were not far behind getting (10%) of the vote.  I don't present a lot of that.  I prefer to not cover a lot of stuff that is common knowledge.  Sometimes I have to give some background, but normally I try to add to what is common knowledge rather than repeating a lot of it.  I think you'll find some of my rough-water working techniques to be relatively unique, for example.

Only one person selected non-metallic finds as their favorite topic and no one selected big treasure finds from around the world.

The poll asked people to select their one most favorite topic.  That is entirely different from asking what topics people are interested in and allowing multiple responses, and it has to be interpreted differently. 

To me it was surprising how many different topics were the "most" favorite topic for different people. 


On the Treasure Coast the tides are a little bigger.  It looked like near a full moon last night.

Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring equinox.

We have only about a three foot surf today.  The wind was fairly strong from the South today.

The surf is expected to increase Thursday, after a North wind on Wednesday evening.  That might be worth checking out.  We'll see if the surf gets up to its predicted size Thursday.


I've been going through some old 8mm family movie film from the 50s and looking for whatever I might want to have converted to DVD.  I showed one small piece of family film in this blog back some time ago.   But what struck me is that after going through reels and reels of film, the only thing I really want to have copied and preserved are movies of the people.  Many of them are now gone, while others are 50 or 60 years older.  I don't much care about the places and things that they thought were neat enough to capture on film.  The only stuff that I care about preserving now, all these years later, are the people.   I'm glad that I have some of that captured on film.   All the other stuff doesn't seem to matter much.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

4/9/14 Report - Old Railroad Freight Tag, Setting The Record Straight On The 1715 Fleet Diamond Ring & Returned Wallet

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Old Copper Railroad Freight Tag Find.

To start off today I have to say thanks to this blog's readers for all the help I get.  You can probably tell that I often do my posts in a bit of a hurry.  Heaven knows that by the time I enter the material and then try to edit it a time or two or more, I sometimes end up with something messed up.  I try to get it right but make mistakes.   I think most of my errors are simple things like typos that you can figure out or work around, but it isn't always that way.  In any case I have to thank you all for the help you do provide in providing photos, reports, links, information and corrections.

Above is a find from James F.  And here is the story of the find as described by James.

Well, due to some ongoing road work, I've been finding artifacts in a very old town north of Orlando...so old in fact, that when the roads were torn up, large amounts of what was left of the original 19th Century brick road (which had been paved over in the 20th Century with asphalt (who knew?) was found scattered all over the site, so we have been locating some very old coinage and artifacts which have lain under the brick portion of the road for quite some time. Here is one artifact I discovered which is apparently (after I spent literally days using electrolysis and good ol' elbow grease, scrubbing toothbrush and toothpaste and baking soda and hot water (the list goes on :-)  Seems to be a 2" diameter solid copper railroad freight tag identifying a load of "8 IN FLUE THIMBLE" shipped by the S.F, R.R. with an identification mark of "A   127" I don't know if this indicates the number of items shipped, the order, or waybill number...anyway, it's pretty cool...just thought I'd let you know we are still finding cool items underground as opposed to under-sand and water.

Thanks for the report James.  Great find!

If anyone can answer any of James' questions, shoot me an email. 


I got an email from Christopher P.  who said he had no problem with the video that I posted.  I'm glad to know that.  It might help me narrow down the problem. 


Bruce Beck, who you might know from his diving courses or salvage work, was able to offer some first hand information concerning the 1715 Fleet diamond ring that I mentioned in my 4/7/14 post.

Here is what Bruce said about the find.   Actually, my dive partner and friend, Christopher R. James found the gold hole on his own about seventy-five yards from the Pandion, Bob’s boat.  ... Christopher first found the butterfly brooch and then the rest of the crew of the Pandion, including Bob Weller, blew holes in an area about the size of a pickup truck and uncovered the rest. I wrote a feature article about Christopher’s recoveries on different sites in the June 1997 edition of Lost Treasure magazine. I was an investor of Bob’s in 1994 and Christopher and I began our partnership in 1995.

If you can find the June 1997 issue, I'm sure you would enjoy reading that article getting even more of the details surrounding that find.

Thanks much for the information Bruce!  I really appreciate it.


Did you know that you can tell the type of beer from the shape of old ring style pull tabs.

William K. sent me a list of beer types and pictures of the corresponding pull tabs. 

Thanks William!


Maybe you heard this nice story.   A 16 year-old high school student lost his wallet at the stadium on opening day at a Marlins game.  Someone found it, and not only did they go to the trouble of returning the wallet anonymously, but inside the returned wallet was an additional $20 and a note telling the student that the student might see that the world isn't such a bad place.  The note also told him to pass the good deed along in the future.

Here is the actual story.

http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2014/04/08/miami-high-school-student-wallet-returned-anonymously-with-extra-20-and-special/


The blog poll seems to be going well.  Still a couple of days left to respond.

I was more hurried today than normal but managed to get a post done because of all the help I received.

I'll revisit some of these things in greater detail in the future.  That is all I'm going to be able to enter now.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net